Zhensheng Dai

A new metric of the low-mode asymmetry for ignition target designs

In the deuterium-tritium inertial confinement fusion implosion experiments on the National Ignition Facility, the measured neutron yield and hot spot pressure are significantly lower than simulations. Understanding the underlying physics of the deficit is essential to achieving ignition. This paper investigates the low-mode areal density asymmetry in the main fuel of ignition capsule. It is shown that the areal density asymmetry breaks up the compressed shell and significantly reduces the conversion of implosion kinetic energy to hot spot internal energy, leading to the calculated hot spot pressure and neutron yield quite close to the experimental data. This indicates that the low-mode shell areal density asymmetry can explain part of the large discrepancy between simulations and experiments. Since only using the hot spot shape term could not adequately characterize the effects of the shell areal density asymmetry on implosion performance, a new metric of the low-mode asymmetry is developed to accurately measure the probability of ignition.

Asymmetric-shell ignition capsule design to tune the low-mode asymmetry during the peak drive

The low-mode radiation flux asymmetry in the hohlraum is a main source of performance degradation in the National Ignition Facility (NIF) implosion experiments. To counteract the deleterious effects of the large positive P2 flux asymmetry during the peak drive, this paper develops a new tuning method called asymmetric-shell ignition capsule design which adopts the intentionally asymmetric CH ablator layer or deuterium-tritium (DT) ice layer. A series of two-dimensional implosion simulations have been performed, and the results show that the intentionally asymmetric DT ice layer can significantly improve the fuel ρR symmetry, hot spot shape, hot spot internal energy, and the final neutron yield compared to the spherical capsule. This indicates that the DT asymmetric-shell capsule design is an effective tuning method, while the CH ablator asymmetric-shell capsule could not correct the fuel ρR asymmetry, and it is not as effective as the DT asymmetric-shell capsule design.

Sensitivity study of ignition capsule implosion performance on the hard x-ray spectral distribution of hohlraum

The paper investigates theoretically the sensitivities of ignition capsule implosion performance on the hard x-ray spectral distribution of hohlraum. In the simulation, the hohlraum radiation is represented by a Planckian spectrum for the main drive plus a gaussian bump centered at energy Ec for preheating x-rays. Simulation results show that with the increasing of center energy Ec, the Atwood number at the fuel-ablator interface increases rapidly due to the preheating and expanding of the inner undoped CH layer. The growing of Atwood number indicates the hydrodynamic instability (HI) growth and mixing at this interface. On the other hand, the increasing of Ec results in a large density gradient scale length of ablation front and stabilizes the HI growth at ablation front. The changes of the hard x-ray spectrum have significant influences on other important implosion parameters including the ablator mass remaining, shock timing, implosion velocity, and yield as well. High-precision results on the hard x-r...

New tuning method of the low-mode asymmetry for ignition capsule implosions

In the deuterium-tritium inertial confinement fusion implosion experiments on the National Ignition Facility, the hot spot and the surrounding main fuel layer show obvious P2 asymmetries. This may be caused by the large positive P2 radiation flux asymmetry during the peak pulse resulting form the poor propagation of the inner laser beam in the gas-filled hohlraum. The symmetry evolution of ignition capsule implosions is investigated by applying P2 radiation flux asymmetries during different time intervals. A series of two-dimensional simulation results show that a positive P2 flux asymmetry during the peak pulse results in a positive P2 shell ρR asymmetry; while an early time positive P2 flux asymmetry causes a negative P2 in the fuel ρR shape. The opposite evolution behavior of shell ρR asymmetry is used to develop a new tuning method to correct the radiation flux asymmetry during the peak pulse by adding a compensating same-phased P2 drive asymmetry during the early time. The significant improvements of the shell ρR symmetry, hot spot shape, hot spot internal energy, and neutron yield indicate that the tuning method is quite effective. The similar tuning method can also be used to control the early time drive asymmetries.

Coupling between interface and velocity perturbations in the weakly nonlinear Rayleigh-Taylor instability

Weakly nonlinear (WN) Rayleigh-Taylor instability(RTI) initiated by single-mode cosinusoidal interface and velocity perturbations is investigated analytically up to the third order. Expressions of the temporal evolutions of the amplitudes of the first three harmonics are derived. It is shown that there are coupling between interface and velocity perturbations, which plays a prominent role in the WN growth. When the “equivalent amplitude” of the initial velocity perturbation, which is normalized by its linear growth rate, is compared to the amplitude of the initial interfaceperturbation, the coupling between them dominates the WN growth of the RTI. Furthermore, the RTI would be mitigated by initiating a velocity perturbation with a relative phase shift against the interfaceperturbation. More specifically, when the phase shift between the interfaceperturbation and the velocity perturbation is π and their equivalent amplitudes are equal, the RTI could be completely quenched. If the equivalent amplitude of the initial velocity perturbation is equal to the initial interfaceperturbation, the difference between the WN growth of the RTI initiated by only an interfaceperturbation and by only a velocity perturbation is found to be asymptotically negligible. The dependence of the WN growth on the Atwood numbers and the initial perturbation amplitudes is discussed. In particular, we investigate the dependence of the saturation amplitude (time) of the fundamental mode on the Atwood numbers and the initial perturbation amplitudes. It is found that the Atwood numbers and the initial perturbation amplitudes play a crucial role in the WN growth of the RTI. Thus, it should be included in applications where the seeds of the RTI have velocity perturbations, such as inertial confinement fusion implosions and supernova explosions.

A new ignition hohlraum design for indirect-drive inertial confinement fusion*

In this paper, a six-cylinder-port hohlraum is proposed to provide high symmetry flux on capsule. It is designed to ignite a capsule with 1.2 mm radius in indirect-drive inertial confinement fusion (ICF) . Flux symmetry and laser energy are calculated by using three dimensional view factor method and laser energy balance in hohlraums. Plasma conditions are analyzed based on the two dimensional radiation-hydrodynamic simulations. There is no Ylm (l<=4) asymmetry in the six-cylinder-port hohlraum when the influences of laser entrance holes (LEHs) and laser spots cancel each other out with suitable target parameters. A radiation drive with 300 eV and good flux symmetry can be achieved with use of laser energy of 2.3 MJ and 500 TW peak power. According to the simulations, the electron temperature and the electron density on the wall of laser cone are high and low, respectively, which are similar to those of outer cones in the hohlraums on National Ignition Facility (NIF). And the laser intensity is also as low as those of NIF outer cones. So the backscattering due to laser plasma interaction (LPI) is considered to be negligible. The six-cyliner-port hohlraum could be superior to the traditional cylindrical hohlraum and the octahedral hohlraum in both higher symmetry and lower backscattering without supplementary technology at acceptable laser energy. It is undoubted that the hohlraum will add to the diversity of ICF approaches.In this paper, a six-cylinder-port hohlraum is proposed to provide high symmetry flux on capsule. It is designed to ignite a capsule with 1.2-mm radius in indirect-drive inertial confinement fusion (ICF). Flux symmetry and laser energy are calculated by using three-dimensional view factor method and laser energy balance in hohlraum. Plasma conditions are analyzed based on the two-dimensional radiation-hydrodynamic simulations. There is no Y lm (l ≤ 4) asymmetry in the six-cylinder-port hohlraum when the influences of laser entrance holes (LEHs) and laser spots cancel each other out with suitable target parameters. A radiation drive with 300 eV and good flux symmetry can be achieved by using a laser energy of 2.3 MJ and peak power of 500 TW. According to the simulations, the electron temperature and the electron density on the wall of laser cone are high and low, respectively, which are similar to those of outer cones in the hohlraums on National Ignition Facility (NIF). And the laser intensity is also as low as those of NIF outer cones. So the backscattering due to laser plasma interaction (LPI) is considered to be negligible. The six-cyliner-port hohlraum could be superior to the traditional cylindrical hohlraum and the octahedral hohlraum in both higher symmetry and lower backscattering without supplementary technology at an acceptable laser energy level. It is undoubted that the hohlraum will add to the diversity of ICF approaches.

Effects of the P2 M-band flux asymmetry of laser-driven gold Hohlraums on the implosion of ICF ignition capsule

Low-mode asymmetries in the laser-indirect-drive inertial confinement fusion implosion experiments conducted on the National Ignition Facility [G. H. Miller et al., Nucl. Fusion 44, S228 (2004)] are deemed the main obstacles hindering further improvement of the nuclear performance of deuterium-tritium-layered capsules. The dominant seeds of these asymmetries include the P2 and P4 asymmetries of x-ray drives and P2 asymmetry introduced by the supporting “tent.” Here, we explore the effects of another possible seed that can lead to low-mode asymmetric implosions, i.e., the M-band flux asymmetry (MFA) in laser-driven cylindrical gold Hohlraums. It is shown that the M-band flux facilitates the ablation and acceleration of the shell, and that positive P2 MFAs can result in negative P2 asymmetries of hot spots and positive P2 asymmetries of shells ρR. An oblate or toroidal hot spot, depending on the P2 amplitude of MFA, forms at stagnation. The energy loss of such a hot spot via electron thermal conduction is ...