Spectroscopic diagnosis of foam z-pinch plasmas on SATURN
- Sandia National Laboratories, Albuquerque, New Mexico 87185-1193 (United States)
- University of Wisconsin, Madison, Wisconsin (United States)
Solid and annular silicon aerogel and agar foams were imploded on the SATURN accelerator to study plasma initiation, acceleration, and stagnation. SATURN delivers 7 MA with a 50 ns 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 extreme ultraviolet spectrometer measured the extent of plasma ablation off the surface of the foam. A time integrated crystal spectrometer showed that characteristic K shell radiation of silicon in the aerogel and of sulfur and sodium impurities in the agar were attenuated when the foam loads were coated with a conductive layer of gold. A 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. {copyright} {ital 1997 American Institute of Physics.}
- OSTI ID:
- 451963
- Report Number(s):
- CONF-960543--
- Journal Information:
- Review of Scientific Instruments, Journal Name: Review of Scientific Instruments Journal Issue: 1 Vol. 68; ISSN 0034-6748; ISSN RSINAK
- Country of Publication:
- United States
- Language:
- English
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