F. E. Merrill

An 800-MeV proton radiography facility for dynamic experiments

The capability has been successfully developed at the Los Alamos Nuclear Science Center (LANSCE) to utilize a spatially and temporally prepared 800-MeV proton beam to produce proton radiographs. A series of proton bursts are transmitted through a dynamically varying object and transported, via a unique magnetic lens system, to an image plane. The magnetic lens system permits correcting for the effects of multiple coulomb scattering which would otherwise completely blur the spatially transmitted information at the image plane. The proton radiographs are recorded on either a time integrating film plate or with a recently developed multi-frame electronic imaging camera system. The latter technique permits obtaining a time dependent series of proton radiographs with time intervals (modulo 358 ns) up to many microseconds and variable time intervals between images. One electronically shuttered, intensified, CCD camera is required per image. These cameras can detect single protons interacting with a scintillating fiber optic array in the image plane but also have a dynamic range which permits recording radiographs with better than 5% statistics for observation of detailed density variations in the object. A number of tests have been carried out to characterize the quality of the proton radiography system for absolute mass determination, resolution, and dynamic range. Initial dynamic experiments characterized the temporal and spatial behavior of shock propagation in high explosives with up to six images per experiment. Based on experience with the prototype system, a number of upgrades are being implemented including the anticipated capability for enhanced mass discrimination through differential multiple coulomb scattering radiographs and more images with improved imaging techniques.

The high-foot implosion campaign on the National Ignition Facilitya)

The “High-Foot” platform manipulates the laser pulse-shape coming from the National Ignition Facility laser to create an indirect drive 3-shock implosion that is significantly more robust against instability growth involving the ablator and also modestly reduces implosion convergence ratio. This strategy gives up on theoretical high-gain in an inertial confinement fusion implosion in order to obtain better control of the implosion and bring experimental performance in-line with calculated performance, yet keeps the absolute capsule performance relatively high. In this paper, we will cover the various experimental and theoretical motivations for the high-foot drive as well as cover the experimental results that have come out of the high-foot experimental campaign. At the time of this writing, the high-foot implosion has demonstrated record total deuterium-tritium yields (9.3×1015) with low levels of inferred mix, excellent agreement with implosion simulations, fuel energy gains exceeding unity, and evidenc...

Charged Particle Radiography

New applications of charged particle radiography have been developed over the past two decades that extend the range of radiographic techniques providing high-speed sequences of radiographs of thicker objects with higher effective dose than can be obtained with conventional radiographic techniques. In this paper, we review the motivation and the development of flash radiography and in particular, charged particle radiography.

A Survey of High Explosive‐Induced Damage and Spall in Selected Metals Using Proton Radiography

Multiple spall and damage layers can be created in metal when the free surface reflects a Taylor wave generated by high explosives. These phenomena have been explored in different thicknesses of several metals (tantalum, copper, 6061 T6‐aluminum, and tin) using high‐energy proton radiography. Multiple images (up to 21) can be produced of the dynamic evolution of damaged material on the microsecond time scale with a <50 ns “shutter” time. Movies and multiframe still images of areal and (Abel inverted) volume densities are presented. An example of material that is likely melted on release (tin) is also presented.

Diagnosing implosion performance at the National Ignition Facility (NIF) by means of neutron spectrometry

The neutron spectrum from a cryogenically layered deuterium?tritium (dt) implosion at the National Ignition Facility (NIF) provides essential information about the implosion performance. From the measured primary-neutron spectrum (13?15?MeV), yield (Yn) and hot-spot ion temperature (Ti) are determined. From the scattered neutron yield (10?12?MeV) relative to Yn, the down-scatter ratio, and the fuel areal density (?R) are determined. These implosion parameters have been diagnosed to an unprecedented accuracy with a suite of neutron-time-of-flight spectrometers and a magnetic recoil spectrometer implemented in various locations around the NIF target chamber. This provides good implosion coverage and excellent measurement complementarity required for reliable measurements of Yn, Ti and ?R, in addition to ?R asymmetries. The data indicate that the implosion performance, characterized by the experimental ignition threshold factor, has improved almost two orders of magnitude since the first shot taken in September 2010. ?R values greater than 1?g?cm?2 are readily achieved. Three-dimensional semi-analytical modelling and numerical simulations of the neutron-spectrometry data, as well as other data for the hot spot and main fuel, indicate that a maximum hot-spot pressure of ?150?Gbar has been obtained, which is almost a factor of two from the conditions required for ignition according to simulations. Observed Yn are also 3?10 times lower than predicted. The conjecture is that the observed pressure and Yn deficits are partly explained by substantial low-mode ?R asymmetries, which may cause inefficient conversion of shell kinetic energy to hot-spot thermal energy at stagnation.

Neutron source reconstruction from pinhole imaging at National Ignition Facility

The neutron imaging system at the National Ignition Facility (NIF) is an important diagnostic tool for measuring the two-dimensional size and shape of the neutrons produced in the burning deuterium-tritium plasma during the ignition stage of inertial confinement fusion (ICF) implosions at NIF. Since the neutron source is small (∼100 μm) and neutrons are deeply penetrating (>3 cm) in all materials, the apertures used to achieve the desired 10-μm resolution are 20-cm long, single-sided tapers in gold. These apertures, which have triangular cross sections, produce distortions in the image, and the extended nature of the pinhole results in a non-stationary or spatially varying point spread function across the pinhole field of view. In this work, we have used iterative Maximum Likelihood techniques to remove the non-stationary distortions introduced by the aperture to reconstruct the underlying neutron source distributions. We present the detailed algorithms used for these reconstructions, the stopping criteria used and reconstructed sources from data collected at NIF with a discussion of the neutron imaging performance in light of other diagnostics.

Magnifying lens for 800 MeV proton radiography

This article describes the design and performance of a magnifying magnetic-lens system designed, built, and commissioned at the Los Alamos National Laboratory (LANL) for 800 MeV flash proton radiography. The technique of flash proton radiography has been developed at LANL to study material properties under dynamic loading conditions through the analysis of time sequences of proton radiographs. The requirements of this growing experimental program have resulted in the need for improvements in spatial radiographic resolution. To meet these needs, a new magnetic lens system, consisting of four permanent magnet quadrupoles, has been developed. This new lens system was designed to reduce the second order chromatic aberrations, the dominant source of image blur in 800 MeV proton radiography, as well as magnifying the image to reduce the blur contribution from the detector and camera systems. The recently commissioned lens system performed as designed, providing nearly a factor of three improvement in radiographic resolution.

Higher velocity, high-foot implosions on the National Ignition Facility lasera)

By increasing the velocity in “high foot” implosions [Dittrich et al., Phys. Rev. Lett. 112, 055002 (2014); Park et al., Phys. Rev. Lett. 112, 055001 (2014); Hurricane et al., Nature 506, 343 (2014); Hurricane et al., Phys. Plasmas 21, 056314 (2014)] on the National Ignition Facility laser, we have nearly doubled the neutron yield and the hotspot pressure as compared to the implosions reported upon last year. The implosion velocity has been increased using a combination of the laser (higher power and energy), the hohlraum (depleted uranium wall material with higher opacity and lower specific heat than gold hohlraums), and the capsule (thinner capsules with less mass). We find that the neutron yield from these experiments scales systematically with a velocity-like parameter of the square root of the laser energy divided by the ablator mass. By connecting this parameter with the inferred implosion velocity ( v), we find that for shots with primary yield >1 × 1015 neutrons, the total yield ∼ v9.4. This incre...

Flash radiography with 24 GeV/c protons

The accuracy of density measurements and position resolution in flash (40 ns) radiography of thick objects with 24 Gev/c protons is investigated. A global model fit to step wedge data is shown to give a good description spanning the periodic table. The parameters obtained from the step wedge data are used to predict transmission through the French Test Object (FTO), a test object of nested spheres, to a precision better than 1%. Multiple trials have been used to show that the systematic errors are less than 2%. Absolute agreement between the average radiographic measurements of the density and the known density is 1%. Spatial resolution has been measured to be 200 μm at the center of the FTO. These data verify expectations of the benefits provided by high energy hadron radiography for thick objects.

Proton Radiography Peers into Metal Solidification

Historically, metals are cut up and polished to see the structure and to infer how processing influences the evolution. We can now peer into a metal during processing without destroying it using proton radiography. Understanding the link between processing and structure is important because structure profoundly affects the properties of engineering materials. Synchrotron x-ray radiography has enabled real-time glimpses into metal solidification. However, x-ray energies favor the examination of small volumes and low density metals. Here we use high energy proton radiography for the first time to image a large metal volume (>10,000 mm3) during melting and solidification. We also show complementary x-ray results from a small volume (<1 mm3), bridging four orders of magnitude. Real-time imaging will enable efficient process development and the control of structure evolution to make materials with intended properties; it will also permit the development of experimentally informed, predictive structure and process models.