Investigation of Proton Beam-Driven Fusion Reactions Generated by an Ultra-Short Petawatt-Scale Laser Pulse

Schollmeier, Marius S.; Shirvanyan, Vahe; Capper, Christie; Steinke, Sven; Higginson, Adam; Hollinger, Reed; Morrison, John T.; Nedbailo, Ryan; Song, Huanyu; Wang, Shoujun; Rocca, Jorge J.; Korn, Georg; Batani, Dimitri

doi:10.1155/2022/2404263

Title: Investigation of Proton Beam-Driven Fusion Reactions Generated by an Ultra-Short Petawatt-Scale Laser Pulse

Journal Article · 01 January 2024 · Laser and Particle Beams

DOI: https://doi.org/10.1155/2022/2404263 · OSTI ID:2420937

^[1]; Shirvanyan, Vahe ^[2]; Capper, Christie ^[2];

^[2];

^[3];

^[3]; Morrison, John T. ^[3];

^[3];

^[3]; Korn, Georg ^[2]; Batani, Dimitri ^[4]

Marvel Fusion GmbH, Munich (Germany); OSTI
Marvel Fusion GmbH, Munich (Germany)
Colorado State Univ., Fort Collins, CO (United States)
University of Bordeaux (France)

We present results from a pitcher-catcher experiment utilizing a proton beam generated with nanostructured targets at a petawatt-class, short-pulse laser facility to induce proton-boron fusion reactions in a secondary target. A 45-fs laser pulse with either 400 nm wavelength and 7 J energy, or 800 nm and 14 J, and an intensity of up to 5 × 10²¹ W/cm² was used to irradiate either thin foil targets or near-solid density, nanostructured targets made of boron nitride (BN) nanotubes. In particular, for 800 nm wavelength irradiation, a BN nanotube target created a proton beam with about five times higher maximum energy and about ten times more protons than a foil target. This proton beam was used to irradiate a thick plate made of boron nitride placed in close proximity to trigger ¹¹B (p, α) 2α fusion reactions. A suite of diagnostics consisting of Thomson parabola ion spectrometers, postshot nuclear activation measurements, neutron time-of-flight detectors, and differentially filtered solid-state nuclear track detectors were used to measure both the primary proton spectrum and the fusion products. From the primary proton spectrum, we calculated (p, n) and (α,n) reactions in the catcher and compare with our measurements. The nuclear activation results agree quantitatively and neutron signals agree qualitatively with the calculations, giving confidence that primary particle distributions can be obtained from such measurements. These results provide new insights for measuring the ion distributions inside of proton-boron fusion targets.

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Research Organization:: Colorado State Univ., Fort Collins, CO (United States)

Sponsoring Organization:: USDOE Office of Science (SC)

Grant/Contract Number:: SC0019076

OSTI ID:: 2420937

Journal Information:: Laser and Particle Beams, Journal Name: Laser and Particle Beams Vol. 2022; ISSN 0263-0346

Publisher:: Cambridge University PressCopyright Statement

Country of Publication:: United States

Language:: English

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