Simulating the magnetized liner inertial fusion plasma confinement with smaller-scale experiments
- Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, Livermore, California 94551 (United States)
- Sandia National Laboratories, Albuquerque, New Mexico 87185 (United States)
The recently proposed magnetized liner inertial fusion approach to a Z-pinch driven fusion [Slutz et al., Phys. Plasmas 17, 056303 (2010)] is based on the use of an axial magnetic field to provide plasma thermal insulation from the walls of the imploding liner. The characteristic plasma transport regimes in the proposed approach cover parameter domains that have not been studied yet in either magnetic confinement or inertial confinement experiments. In this article, an analysis is presented of the scalability of the key physical processes that determine the plasma confinement. The dimensionless scaling parameters are identified and conclusion is drawn that the plasma behavior in scaled-down experiments can correctly represent the full-scale plasma, provided these parameters are approximately the same in two systems. This observation is important in that smaller-scale experiments typically have better diagnostic access and more experiments per year are possible.
- OSTI ID:
- 22072474
- Journal Information:
- Physics of Plasmas, Vol. 19, Issue 6; Other Information: (c) 2012 American Institute of Physics; Country of input: International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA); ISSN 1070-664X
- Country of Publication:
- United States
- Language:
- English
Similar Records
A semi-analytic model of gas-puff liner-on-target magneto-inertial fusion
Beryllium liner implosion experiments on the Z accelerator in preparation for magnetized liner inertial fusion