skip to main content
OSTI.GOV title logo U.S. Department of Energy
Office of Scientific and Technical Information

Title: Shock-wave experiments at threefold compression

Journal Article · · Phys. Rev. A; (United States)

A high-pressure shock wave generated by an underground nuclear explosion was used to obtain precise Hugoniot data from impedance-matching measurements at pressures ranging from 1 to 6 TPa and corresponding to threefold compressions. The shock passed from a 180-mm-diam by 17.5-mm-thick lead driver into a 12-mm-thick molybdenum base plate and then into a central 12-mm-thick /sup 238/U sample surrounded by stacks of the following pairs of 10-mm-thick samples (lower sample first): Mo-Pu (delta phase), W-Pb, Al--porous Mo (19% porosity), C-LiH, Cu-Au, and Fe-quartz (crystalline). Shock-front arrival-time measurements with 80 electrical-contact pins embedded in the assembly were used to determine shock velocities with uncertainties of 1.4--2.6 %; the shock front was found to be slightly curved (with a radius of curvature of approx.2 m) but symmetric about the axis of the cylindrical driver with an upper limit on tilt asymmetry of 1.5 mrad. The measured shock velocity of 30.60 km/s in the molybdenum base plate corresponds to a pressure of 6.43 TPa based on the improved sesame equation of state (EOS) for molybdenum. Impedance-matching analyses using the molybdenum base plate as the standard or reference material for the lower samples and using the lower samples as standards for the upper materials gave the following Hugoniot points in pressure (P) particle-velocity (u) coordinates for the indicated sample materials: Al(P = 2.93 TPa, u = 27.57 km/s), porous Mo(4.65, 19.99), C(2.64, 28.38), LiH(1.225, 35.52), Cu(6.06, 21.15), Fe(5.71, 21.73), and quartz(2.75, 26.76).

Research Organization:
Los Alamos National Laboratory, Los Alamos, New Mexico 87545
OSTI ID:
7120274
Journal Information:
Phys. Rev. A; (United States), Vol. 29:3
Country of Publication:
United States
Language:
English