Design of burning plasma in HYBRID-E and future experiments

One of the last remaining milestones in fusion research before reaching ignition is creating a burning plasma state, where alpha particles from deuterium-tritium (DT) fusion reactions redeposit their energy as the dominant source of heating in the plasma. Recently we have delivered more energy to the hot spot than ever before, while maintaining the extreme pressures required for inertial confinement, which resulted in a burning plasma state and a record ICF fusion energy of 170kJ. This was achieved by developing more efficient hohlraums to symmetrically implode larger fusion targets (1050um inner radius High density Carbon ablators containing 65um thick DT) with long laser pulses designed for lower adiabat, compared to previous experiments. Symmetry was controlled by moving energy between laser beams by wavelength detuning in cylindrical hohlraums, allowing for these larger implosions to be driven at NIF's present laser energy and power capability. In this talk we present the design of these implosions, radiation hydrodynamics simulations of the hot spot burning plasma conditions, and future improvements. Examples of future improvements leverage further development of hohlraum efficiency by reducing the size of laser entrance holes.