Huang Tian-Xuan

Direct drive implosion experiments on SGIII prototype laser facility: Assessing energy coupling efficiency and implosion symmetry

Direct drive implosion experiments were conducted on SGIII prototype laser facility. From the time resolvedx-rayimages, the bright ring and the central bright spot are observed. The radial velocity of the convergent bright ring indicates the shell velocity, and the times when the central bright spot is first seen and becomes most intensive indicate the times of shock convergence and later stagnation, respectively. Radiation hydrodynamic simulations were carried out by changing laser energy deposition factors. When the simulated results are brought close to the measured ones, it is found that the energy coupling efficiency is around 70%. The implosion symmetry is indicated by the core x-ray emission pattern which is pancake when viewing from the equator, and splits into several bright spots when viewing close to the pole. A simple model is developed to understand this asymmetry. It is speculated that the observed implosion asymmetry can be attributed to the laser arrangement which is originally designed for indirect drive experiments. Further improvements of energy coupling efficiency and implosion symmetry in future experiments can be achieved by optimizing target design and laser arrangement.

Preliminary results from direct-drive cryogenic target implosion experiments on SGIII prototype laser facility

Since ignition target design with layered deuterium and triterium ice had been proposed several decades ago, much effort was devoted to fabricate and implode cryogenic targets. Until recently, direct-drive cryogenic target implosion experiment was carried out on SGIII prototype laser facility. The target consisted of a plastic capsule supported by fill tube. Cryogenic helium gas was used to cool the capsule to a few degrees below the deuterium triple point. The resulting deuterium ice layer was characterized by optical shadowgraph and smoothed by applied temperature gradient. Eight laser beams with total energy of 7 kJ were used to directly drive the implosion. On the path of laser light to the capsule, there were 500 nm sealing film and helium gas of mm length. X-ray pinhole images were analyzed to confirm that the sealing film, and helium gas had little effect on aiming accuracy but caused some loss of laser energy especially when condensation on the sealing film was observed.

Radiation Temperature Scaling Law for Gold Hohlraum Heated with Lasers at 0.35 mm Wavelength

We have carried out the hohlraum experiments about radiation temperature scaling on the Shenguang-II (SG-II) laser facility with eight laser beams of 0.35 μm, pulse duration of about 1.0 ns and total energy of 2000 J. The reradiated x-ray flux through the laser entrance hole was measured using a soft x-ray spectrometer. The measured peak radiation temperature was 170 eV for the standard hohlraum and 150 eV for the 1.5-scaled one. We have derived the radiation temperature scaling law, in which the laser hohlraum coupling efficiency is included. With an appropriate coupling efficiency, the coincidences between experimental and scaling hohlraum radiation temperatures are rather good.

Emission spectrum from an Al/Mg tracer in the blow-off region of a radiatively ablated capsule

A study of X-ray emissions from Al/Mg tracers buried at two different depths in a plastic shell is presented. The X-rays originating from the K-shell transitions of the Al/Mg ions begin to irradiate after the ablative heating wave has passed through the trace layer and are recorded with a streaked crystal spectrometer. Only emissions from the capsule with the trace layer buried at a smaller depth are observed. Hydrodynamic simulations and a collisional—radiative model including detailed atomic physics are used to investigate the measured spectrum. It is found that the effects of the radiative heating play important roles in the formation of the K-shell emission. The time correlation between the simulations and the measurements is obtained by comparing the measured time profile of the He α emission with the calculated one. The line ratio of Ly α to He α is also calculated and is found to be in fairly good agreement with the experimental data. Finally, the relation between the time profile of the He α emission and the ablation velocity is also discussed.

Orbital Relaxation Effects in the Calculation of Aluminum K α Absorptions

A recent experimental Kα transmission spectrum of an aluminum plasma is theoretically studied by a detailed level accounting model. It is found that the orbital relaxation effects of the K- and L-shell orbitals should be considered to calculate accurate line positions and strengths. To do this the initial and the final radial wave functions of Kα lines are respectively optimized by solving the full relativistic Dirac–Fock equation. Extensive configuration interaction calculations are performed to obtain the energy levels and the oscillator strengths. It is shown that both the line positions and the line strengths agree quite well with experiment when the orbital relaxations are considered.

Experiments and analysis of gold disk targets irradiated by smoothing beams of Xingguang II facilities with 350 nm wavelength

Gold disk targets were irradiated using focusing and beam smoothing methods on Xingguang (XG-II) laser facilities with 350 nm wavelength, 0.6 ns pulse width and 20–80 Joules energies. Laser absorption, light scattering and X-ray conversion were experimentally investigated. The experimental results showed that laser absorption and scattered light were about 90% and 10%, respectively, under focusing irradiation, but the laser absorption increased 5%–10% and the scattered light about 1% under the condition of beam smoothing. Compared with the case of focusing irradiation, the laser absorption was effectively improved and the scattered light remarkably dropped under uniform irradiation; then due to the decrease in laser intensity, X-ray conversion increased. This is highly advantageous to the inertial confinement fusion. However, X-ray conversion mechanism basically did not change and X-ray conversion efficiency under beam smoothing and focusing irradiation was basically the same.

Progress of indirectly driven implosion experiments

Achieving ignition via inertial confinement approach is of strong application value and important science significance. It is also a project of large scale that depends on the national strength. Involving theory, target fabrication, diagnostics, and laser facilities, integrated implosion experiment plays an important role in the research of ICF. Since the first successful neutron production with directly driven implosion in the 80’s, the quasi one-dimensional implosion performance dominated by shock compression was demonstrated in the period of 1990–2010, and the quasi one-dimensional implosion performance dominated by inertial compression was achieved in recent years. All of these facts definitely show the progress on improving the performance of integrated implosion. With the completion of SG-III laser facility, and in the situation of facing frustration in the US ignition program, there is grand opportunity and challenge when we are exploring toward the ignition parameter space with higher convergence ratio and lower adiabat.

Radiation Energy Loss from Laser-Heated Shenguang-II Hohlraums

The x ray energy loss out of laser-heated hohlraum through laser entrance holes (LEH) is discussed in detail according to a simple theoretical model and is compared with the hohlraum experimental data measured at Shenguang II laser facility. The radiation loss is considered to be composed of two parts, that is, direct contribution from laser spots and re-emitted part from the x ray-heated hohlraum inner wall, and the former accounts for about 20% of the total loss for the Shenguang II hohlraums. Owing to the non-equilibrium characteristics of laser target coupling the direct contribution part is non-equilibrium in spectrum.

Diagnostics of electron temperature and ions distribution in expanding Al plasmas pumped by a ns-pulsed 1.06μm laser

Resonance lines are extensively used to diagnose electronic temperature Te and ions distribution. However, the analysis of the x-ray spectroscopy emitted from plasmas produced by a ns laser usually needs the help of a code or some assumptions. In this paper, a diagnostic idea of using line-pairs emitted from a doubly-excited state is proposed. By using the method presented in this paper, Te and the fractional population ratio of bare nuclei and H-like ions are directly obtained from the emission intensity ratios.