Yi-Ming Wang

Analysis of NIF experiments with the minimal energy implosion model

We apply a recently developed analytical model of implosion and thermonuclear burn to fusion capsule experiments performed at the National Ignition Facility that used low-foot and high-foot laser pulse formats. Our theoretical predictions are consistent with the experimental data. Our studies, together with neutron image analysis, reveal that the adiabats of the cold fuel in both low-foot and high-foot experiments are similar. That is, the cold deuterium-tritium shells in those experiments are all in a high adiabat state at the time of peak implosion velocity. The major difference between low-foot and high-foot capsule experiments is the growth of the shock-induced instabilities developed at the material interfaces which lead to fuel mixing with ablator material. Furthermore, we have compared the NIF capsules performance with the ignition criteria and analyzed the alpha particle heating in the NIF experiments. Our analysis shows that alpha heating was appreciable only in the high-foot experiments.

Effects of preheat and mix on the fuel adiabat of an imploding capsule

We demonstrate the effect of preheat, hydrodynamic mix and vorticity on the adiabat of the deuterium-tritium (DT) fuel in fusion capsule experiments. We show that the adiabat of the DT fuel increases resulting from hydrodynamic mixing due to the phenomenon of entropy of mixture. An upper limit of mix, Mclean/MDT ≥ 0.98, is found necessary to keep the DT fuel on a low adiabat. We demonstrate in this study that the use of a high adiabat for the DT fuel in theoretical analysis and with the aid of 1D code simulations could explain some aspects of 3D effects and mix in capsule implosion. Furthermore, we can infer from our physics model and the observed neutron images the adiabat of the DT fuel in the capsule and the amount of mix produced on the hot spot.