Studying astrophysical collisionless shocks in the laboratory

ORAL

Abstract

High Mach number astrophysical plasmas can create collisionless shocks via plasma instabilities and turbulence that are responsible for magnetic field generations and cosmic ray acceleration. Laboratory experiments with high-Mach number, collisionless plasma flows can provide critical information to help understand the mechanisms of shock. A series of experiments were conducted on Omega and the National Ignition Facility to observe: the filamentary Weibel instability that seeds microscale magnetic fields [1, 2]; collisionless shock formation seen by an abrupt ~4x increase in density and ~6x increase in temperature; and electron acceleration distributions that deviated from the thermal distributions [3]. In addition to the case of collisionless shock formation under unmagnetized initial condition, shock formation under magnetized environment is also being studied [4]. Experimental results along with theoretical interpretations aided by particle-in-cell simulations will be discussed.

[1] H.-S. Park et al., HEDP 8, 38 (2012)

[2] C. Huntington et al., Nature Physics 11, 173 (2015)

[3] F. Fiuza et al., Nature Physics, 16, 916 (2020)

[4] E. Tubman et al., in preparation (2024)

*This work was performed under the auspices of the U.S. Department of Energy by Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory under Contract DE-AC52-07NA27344.

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Publication: [1] H.-S. Park et al., HEDP 8, 38 (2012)
[2] C. Huntington et al., Nature Physics 11, 173 (2015)
[3] F. Fiuza et al., Nature Physics, 16, 916 (2020)
[4] E. Tubman et al., in preparation (2024)

Presenters

  • Hye-Sook Park

    • LLNL
    • Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory

Authors

  • Hye-Sook Park

    • LLNL
    • Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory

  • Eleanor R Tubman

    • Imperia College London

  • Frederico Fiuza

    • Instituto Superior Tecnico (Portugal)
    • IST University of Lisbon

  • Colin Bruulsema

    • Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory

  • Anna Grassi

    • LULI-Sorbonne Universite
    • Sorbonne Universite

  • Drew P Higginson

    • Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory

  • David Jeffrey Larson

    • Lawrence Livermore Natl Lab

  • Mario J Manuel

    • General Atomics

  • Kassie Moczulski

    • University of Rochester

  • Michael Pokornik

    • University of California, San Diego

  • Bradley B Pollock

    • Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory

  • George F Swadling

    • Lawrence Livermore Natl Lab
    • Lawrence Livermore Natl Laboratory

  • Petros Tzeferacos

    • University of Rochester