A comparative study of single and double gas puff Z-pinches on CESZAR
ORAL
Abstract
Gas puff Z-pinches1 are of great interest for fusion and X-ray source applications. The Magneto Rayleigh-Taylor Instability (MRTI) is particularly destructive in this configuration and poses a significant challenge in achieving stable implosions. Much work has been done on studying implosion stability and MRTI-mitigation techniques for gas puff Z-pinches. This study's focus is on snowplow stabilization2 using a structured gas puff load, specifically employing a double gas puff with a hollow liner (Ar) centered on a solid-fill target (D2). Here we present results comparing single hollow shell gas puffs with coaxial double gas puffs on CESZAR a 500kA, 160ns fast Linear Transformer Driver. The main diagnostics used in these experiments were a time gated XUV pinhole camera producing up to four spatially resolved frames along the implosion timeline and filtered pin diodes to measure X-rays emitted by the pinch. We describe the effect of this mitigation technique on implosion dynamics and X-ray production here. To complement experimental findings, 2-D simulations were performed on the radiation-MHD code, MACH2.
**This work is supported by the Department of Energy, National Nuclear Security Administrationunder Awards No. DE-NA0003842 and DE-NA0004031
–
Publication: [1] J. L. Giuliani and R. J. Commisso, "A Review of the Gas-Puff Z-Pinch as an X-Ray and Neutron Source," IEEE Transactions on Plasma Science, vol. 43, no. 8, pp. 2385–2453, 2015, doi: 10.1109/TPS.2015.2451157.
[2] S. M. Gol'berg and A. L. Velikovich, "Suppression of Rayleigh-Taylor instability by the snowplow mechanism," Physics of Fluids B, vol. 5, no. 4, pp. 1164–1172, 1993, doi: 10.1063/1.860974.
Presenters
-
Apsara Williams
- University of California San Diego
- University of California, San Diego