Spectroscopic diagnosis of foam z-pinch plasmas on SATURN
- Sandia National Labs., Albuquerque, NM (United States)
- Wisconsin Univ., Madison, WI (United States)
Solid and annular silicon aerogel and agar foams were shot on the accelerator SATURN to study plasma initiation, acceleration, and stagnation. SATURN delivers 7 MA with a 50 nsec rise time to these foam loads. We fielded several spectroscopic diagnostics to measure plasma parameters throughout the z-pinch discharge. A spatially resolved single frame time-gated EUV spectrometer measured the extent of plasma ablation off the surface foam. A time integrated crystal spectrometer showed that characteristic K shell radiation of silicon in the aerogel and of S and Na impurities in the agar were all attenuated when the foam loads were coated with a conductive layer of gold. The time resolved pinhole camera showed that in general the quality of the pinch implosions was poor but improved with increasing efforts to improve current continuity such as prepulse and conductive coatings.
- Research Organization:
- Sandia National Labs., Albuquerque, NM (United States)
- Sponsoring Organization:
- USDOE, Washington, DC (United States)
- DOE Contract Number:
- AC04-94AL85000
- OSTI ID:
- 243438
- Report Number(s):
- SAND--96-1290C; CONF-960543--1; ON: DE96010986
- Country of Publication:
- United States
- Language:
- English
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