D. Varentsov

Present and future perspectives for high energy density physics with intense heavy ion and laser beams

Intense heavy ion beams from the Gesellschaft fur Schwerionenforschung ~GSI, Darmstadt, Germany! accelerator facilities, together with two high energy laser systems: petawatt high energy laser for ion experiments ~PHELIX! and nanosecond high energy laser for ion experiments ~NHELIX! are a unique combination to facilitate pioneering beam-plasma interaction experiments, to generate and probe high-energy-density ~HED! matter and to address basic physics issues associated with heavy ion driven inertial confinement fusion. In one class of experiments, the laser will be used to generate plasma and the ion beam will be used to study the energy loss of energetic ions in ionized matter, and to probe the physical state of the laser-generated plasma. In another class of experiments, the intense heavy ion beam will be employed to create a sample of HED matter and the laser beam, together with other diagnostic tools, will be used to explore the properties of these exotic states of matter. The existing heavy ion synchrotron facility, SIS18, deliver an intense uranium beam that deposit about 1 kJ0g specific energy in solid matter. Using this beam, experiments have recently been performed where solid lead foils had been heated and a brightness temperature on the order of 5000 K was measured, using a fast multi-channel pyrometer that has been developed jointly by GSI and IPCP Chernogolovka. It is expected that the future heavy ion facility, facility for antiprotons and ion research ~FAIR! will provide compressed beam pulses with an intensity that exceeds the current beam intensities by three orders of magnitude. This will open up the possibility to explore the thermophysical and transport properties of HED matter in a regime that is very difficult to access using the traditional methods of shock compression. Beam plasma interaction experiments using dense plasmas with a G-parameter between 0.5 and 1.5 have also been carried out. This dense Ar-plasma was generated by explosively driven shockwaves and showed enhanced energy loss for Xe and Ar ions in the energy range between 5.9 to 11.4 MeV.

Target heating in high-energy-density matter experiments at the proposed GSI FAIR facility: Non-linear bunch rotation in SIS100 and optimization of spot size and pulse length

The Gesellschaft fur Schwerionenforschung ~GSI! Darmstadt has been approved to build a new powerful facility named FAIR ~Facility for Antiprotons and Ion Research! which involves the construction of a new synchrotron ring SIS100. In this paper, we will report on the results of a parameter study that has been carried out to estimate the minimum pulse lengths and the maximum peak powers achievable, using bunch rotation RF gymnastic-including nonlinearities of the RF gap voltage in SIS100, using a longitudinal dynamics particle in cell ~PIC! code, ESME. These calculations have shown that a pulse length of the order of 20 ns may be possible when no prebunching is performed while the pulse length gradually increases with the prebunching voltage. Three different cases, including 0.4 GeV0 u, 1G eV 0u, and 2.7 GeV0u are considered for the particle energy. The worst case is for the kinetic energy of 0.4 GeV0u which leads to a pulse length of about 100 ns for a prebunching voltage of 100 kV ~RF amplitude!. The peak power was found to have a maximum, however, at 0.5‐1.5kV prebunching voltage, depending on the mean kinetic energy of the ions. It is expected that the SIS100 will deliver a beam with an intensity of 1‐2 3 10 12 ions. Availability of such a powerful beam will make it possible to study the properties of high-energy-density ~HED! matter in a parameter range that is very difficult to access by other means. These studies involve irradiation of high density targets by the ion beam for which optimization of the target heating is the key problem. The temperature to which a target can be heated depends on the power that is deposited in the material by the projectile ions. The optimization of the power, however, depends on the interplay of various parameters including beam intensity, beam spot area, and duration of the ion bunch. The purpose of this paper is to determine a set of the above parameters that would lead to an optimized target heating by the future SIS100 beam.

A study on fabrication, manipulation and survival of cryogenic targets required for the experiments at the Facility for Antiproton and Ion Research: FAIR

Cylindrical cryogenic targets are required to carry out the Laboratory Planetary Science scheme of the experiments of the High Energy Density matter Generated by Heavy Ion Beams collaboration at FAIR. In this paper, for the first time a thorough analysis of the problem of such targets’ fabrication, delivery and positioning in the center of the experimental chamber has been made. Particular attention is paid to the issue of a specialized cryogenic system creation intended for rep-rate supply of the High Energy Density matter Generated by Heavy Ion Beams experiments with the cylindrical cryogenic targets.

Frontiers of dense plasma physics with intense ion and laser beams and accelerator technology

Interaction phenomena of intense ion and laser radiation with matter have a large range of application in different fields of science, from basic research of plasma properties to application in energy science. The hot dense plasma of our neighbouring star the Sun provides a deep insight into the physics of fusion, the properties of matter at high energy density, and is moreover an excellent laboratory for astroparticle physics. As such the Suns interior plasma can even be used to probe the existence of novel particles and dark matter candidates. We present an overview on recent results and developments of dense plasma physics addressed with heavy ion and laser beams combined with accelerator and nuclear physics technology.

Time-resolved energy loss spectroscopy of energetic heavy ion beams generating a dense plasma

Abstract At the Gesellschaft fur Schwerionenforschung (GSI) Darmstadt, intense beams of energetic heavy ions have been used to generate hot dense plasmas by impact on solid targets. Recently, we have measured time evolution of the energy loss of intense beams (109–1010 particles/pulse) of 190 MeV/u 238 U as well as of 300 MeV/u 86 Kr in cryogenic crystals of neon and xenon, respectively. For this purpose, a new time resolving energy loss spectrometer has been set up. We observed continuous reduction in the energy loss due to hydrodynamic motion of the ion beam heated target matter. These are the first measurements of this kind. Two-dimensional hydrodynamic simulations were also carried out using the above beam and target parameters. Good agreement has been found between the experimental results and the simulations.

Energy loss dynamics of intense heavy ion beams interacting with solid targets

At the Gesellschaft fur Schwerionenforschung (GSI, Darmstadt) intense beams of energetic heavy ions have been used to generate high-energy-density (HED) state in matter by impact on solid targets. Recently, we have developed a new method by which we use the same heavy ion beam that heats the target to provide information about the physical state of the interior of the target (Varentsov et al., 2001). This is accomplished by measuring the energy loss dynamics (ELD) of the beam emerging from the back surface of the target. For this purpose, a new time-resolving energy loss spectrometer (scintillating Bragg-peak (SBP) spectrometer) has been developed. In our experiments we have measured energy loss dynamics of intense beams of 238 U, 86 Kr, 40 Ar, and 18 O ions during the interaction with solid rare-gas targets, such as solid Ne and solid Xe. We observed continuous reduction in the energy loss during the interaction time due to rapid hydrodynamic response of the ion-beam-heated target matter. These are the first measurements of this kind. Two-dimensional hydrodynamic simulations were carried out using the beam and target parameters of the experiments. The conducted research has established that the ELD measurement technique is an excellent diagnostic method for HED matter. It specifically allows for direct and quantitative comparison with the results of hydrodynamic simulations, providing experimental data for verification of computer codes and underlying theoretical models. The ELD measurements will be used as a standard diagnostics in the future experiments on investigation of the HED matter induced by intense heavy ion beams, such as the HI-HEX (Heavy Ion Heating and EXpansion) EOS studies (Hoffmann et al., 2002).

Electrical resistivity measurements of heavy ion beam generated high energy density aluminium

The high intensity heavy ion beams provided by the accelerator facilities of the Gesellschaft fur Schwerionenforschung (GSI) Darmstadt are an excellent tool to produce large volumes of high energy density (HED) matter. Thermophysical and transport properties of HED matter states are of interest for fundamental as well as for applied research. In this paper we present the most recent results on electrical resistivity of HED matter obtained at the High Temperature Laboratory of the Plasma Physics Department of GSI. The targets under investigation consisted of 5 mm long and 0.25 mm diameter aluminium wires. Uranium beam pulses with durations of approximately 200 ns, intensities of about 2 × 109 ions/bunch and an initial ion energy of 350 A MeV have been used as a driver. An energy density deposition of about 1 kJ g−1 has been achieved by focussing the ion beam to less than 1 mm FWHM. Under these conditions, resistivities of up to 1.5 × 10−6 Ω m have been observed within 1 µs after irradiation.

Fundamental studies of intense heavy-ion beam interaction with solid targets

Intense (10/sup 11/ particles/1 /spl mu/s /spl sim/300 MeV/u) heavy ion beams are generated in the heavy-ion synchrotron (SIS) of the GSI-Darmstadt facility. Large volumes of strongly coupled plasmas are produced by heavy ion beam interaction with solid targets, with plasma densities close to the solid state, pressures of about 100 kbar, and temperatures of up to 1 eV, with relevance for equation of state (EOS) of matter, astrophysics, and low-entropy shock compression of solids. The plasmas created by ion beam interaction with metallic converters and cryogenic crystals were studied by backlighting shadowgraphy and by time-resolved spectroscopy in the visible and vacuum ultraviolet ranges. Low entropy weak shock waves induced by the ion beams in the metal-plexiglass multilayered targets were visualized by time resolved schlieren measurements, revealing induced multiple shockwaves with pressures higher than 15 kbar in a plexiglass window and propagation velocities up to 35% higher than the speed of sound in plexiglass at room temperature. To get an insight into the plasma dynamics, both types of experiments are simulated by the BIG-2 two-dimensional hydrodynamic code.

Commissioning of the PRIOR proton microscope

Recently, a new high energy proton microscopy facility PRIOR (Proton Microscope for FAIR Facility for Anti-proton and Ion Research) has been designed, constructed, and successfully commissioned at GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung (Darmstadt, Germany). As a result of the experiments with 3.5-4.5 GeV proton beams delivered by the heavy ion synchrotron SIS-18 of GSI, 30 μm spatial and 10 ns temporal resolutions of the proton microscope have been demonstrated. A new pulsed power setup for studying properties of matter under extremes has been developed for the dynamic commissioning of the PRIOR facility. This paper describes the PRIOR setup as well as the results of the first static and dynamic proton radiography experiments performed at GSI.

The creation of strongly coupled plasmas using an intense heavy ion beam: low-entropy compression of hydrogen and the problem of hydrogen metallization

Intense heavy ion beams deposit energy very efficiently over extended volumes of solid density targets, thereby creating large samples of strongly coupled plasmas. Intense beams of energetic heavy ions are therefore an ideal tool to research this interesting field. It is also possible to design experiments using special beam–target geometries to achieve low-entropy compression of samples of matter. This type of experiments is of particular interest for studying the problem of hydrogen metallization. In this paper we present a design study of such a proposed experiment that will be carried out at the future heavy ion synchrotron facility SIS100, at the Gesellschaft fur Schwerionenforschung, Darmstadt. This study has been done using a two-dimensional hydrodynamic computer code. The target consists of a solid hydrogen cylinder that is enclosed in a thick shell of lead whose one face is irradiated with an ion beam which has an annular (ring shaped) focal spot. The beam intensity and other parameters are considered to be the same as expected at the future SIS100 facility. The simulations show that due to multiple shock reflection between the cylinder axis and the lead–hydrogen boundary, one can achieve up to 20 times solid density in hydrogen while keeping the temperature as low as a few thousand K. The corresponding pressure is of the order of 10 Mbar. These values of the physical parameters lie within the range of theoretically predicted values for hydrogen metallization. We have also carried out a parameter study of this problem by varying the target and beam parameters over a wide range. It has been found that the results are very insensitive to such changes in the input parameters.