Gain curves and hydrodynamic modeling for shock ignition

Journal Article · Sat May 15 04:00:00 EDT 2010 · Physics of Plasmas

DOI:https://doi.org/10.1063/1.3407623· OSTI ID:21371132

Lafon, M; Ribeyre, X; Schurtz, G ^[1]

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1. Centre Lasers Intenses et Applications, Universite Bordeaux 1-CNRS-CEA, 351 Cours de la Liberation, Talence 33405 (France)

Ignition of a precompressed thermonuclear fuel by means of a converging shock is now considered as a credible scheme to obtain high gains for inertial fusion energy. This work aims at modeling the successive stages of the fuel time history, from compression to final thermonuclear combustion, in order to provide the gain curves of shock ignition (SI). The leading physical mechanism at work in SI is pressure amplification, at first by spherical convergence, and by collision with the shock reflected at center during the stagnation process. These two effects are analyzed, and ignition conditions are provided as functions of the shock pressure and implosion velocity. Ignition conditions are obtained from a non-isobaric fuel assembly, for which we present a gain model. The corresponding gain curves exhibit a significantly lower ignition threshold and higher target gains than conventional central ignition.

• OSTI ID: 21371132
• Journal Information: Physics of Plasmas, Journal Name: Physics of Plasmas Journal Issue: 5 Vol. 17; ISSN PHPAEN; ISSN 1070-664X
• Country of Publication: United States
• Language: English

Related Subjects

70 PLASMA PHYSICS AND FUSION TECHNOLOGY
FUELS
INERTIAL FUSION DRIVERS
PLASMA
SHOCK WAVES
THERMONUCLEAR FUELS
THERMONUCLEAR IGNITION