First High-Convergence Cryogenic Implosion in a Near-Vacuum Hohlraum
Name
PhysRevLett.114.175001.pdf
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2.59 MB
Format
Adobe PDF
Checksum (MD5)
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Author(s)
Berzak Hopkins, L. F.
Meezan, N. B.
Le Pape, S.
Divol, L.
Mackinnon, A. J.
Ho, D. D.
Hohenberger, M.
Jones, O. S.
Kyrala, G. A.
Milovich, J. L.
Date Issued
April 2015
Journal
Physical Review Letters
Publisher
American Physical Society
Citation
Berzak Hopkins, L. F., et al. "First High-Convergence Cryogenic Implosion in a Near-Vacuum Hohlraum." Phys. Rev. Lett. 114, 175001 (April 2015). © 2015 American Physical Society
Version
Final published version
Abstract
Recent experiments on the National Ignition Facility [M. J. Edwards et al., Phys. Plasmas 20, 070501 (2013)] demonstrate that utilizing a near-vacuum hohlraum (low pressure gas-filled) is a viable option for high convergence cryogenic deuterium-tritium (DT) layered capsule implosions. This is made possible by using a dense ablator (high-density carbon), which shortens the drive duration needed to achieve high convergence: a measured 40% higher hohlraum efficiency than typical gas-filled hohlraums, which requires less laser energy going into the hohlraum, and an observed better symmetry control than anticipated by standard hydrodynamics simulations. The first series of near-vacuum hohlraum experiments culminated in a 6.8 ns, 1.2 MJ laser pulse driving a 2-shock, high adiabat (α ~ 3.5) cryogenic DT layered high density carbon capsule. This resulted in one of the best performances so far on the NIF relative to laser energy, with a measured primary neutron yield of 1.8×10[superscript 15] neutrons, with 20% calculated alpha heating at convergence ~27×.
MIT Department
Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Plasma Science and Fusion Center
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DOI of Published Version
https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevLett.114.175001
