Implosion Experiments using Glass Ablators for Direct-Drive Inertial Confinement Fusion

Journal Article · Wed Apr 21 00:00:00 EDT 2010 · Physical Review Letters

DOI:https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevLett.104.165002· OSTI ID:976670

Direct-drive implosions with 20-um-thick glass shells were conducted on the Omega Laser Facility to test the performance of high-Z glass ablators for direct-drive, inertial confinement fusion. The x-ray signal caused by hot electrons generated by two-plasmon-decay instability was reduced by more than ~40x and hot-electron temperature by ~2x in the glass compared to plastic ablators at ignition-relevant drive intensities of ~1 x 10^15 W/cm^2, suggesting reduced target preheat. The measured absorption and compression were close to 1D predictions. The measured soft x-ray production in the spectral range of ~2 to 4 keV was ~2x to 3x lower than 1D predictions, indicating that the shell preheat caused by soft x-rays is less than predicted. A direct-drive-ignition design based on glass ablators is introduced.

• Research Organization: Univ. of Rochester, NY (United States). Lab. for Laser Energetics
• Sponsoring Organization: USDOE
• DOE Contract Number: FC52-08NA28302
• OSTI ID: 976670
• Report Number(s): DOE/NA/28302-943; 2009-81; 1924
• Journal Information: Physical Review Letters, Vol. 104, Issue 16
• Country of Publication: United States
• Language: English