Igniting ICF experiments with increased compression using a ramped laser pulse at the National Ignition Facility

ORAL

Abstract

Increasing fuel compression is key for realizing increased yield for a given drive energy in inertial confinement fusion implosions. The SQ-n design [1] at the National Ignition Facility (NIF) uses a ramped laser pulse to generate a smoothly accelerating implosion, which is predicted, when combined with improved capsule dopant profiles, to reduce mixing and thereby increase fuel compression [2,3]. Prior experiments at subcale (844 um inner radius capsules) and at full scale (1050 um inner radius capsules, 1.9 MJ laser energy) have demonstrated increased compression compared with other implosions at NIF that also use high-density-carbon ablators [4,5]. Here we report on full scale SQ-n experiments using 2.05 MJ of laser energy, which again confirm increased compression of the fuel, now with MJ fusion yield.

[1] Clark et al., Physics of Plasmas 29, 052710 (2022)

[2] Do et al., Phys. Rev. Lett. 129, 215003 (2022)

[3] Weber et al., Phys. Rev. E 108, L023202 (2023)

[4] Tommasini et al., Phys. Rev. Res. 5, L042034 (2023)

[5] Tommasini et al., Phys. Plasmas 32, 032707 (2025)

*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:

Presenters

  • Seth Davidovits

    • Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory

Authors

  • Seth Davidovits

    • Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory

  • Daniel T Casey

    • Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory
    • Lawrence LIvermore National Laboratory

  • Riccardo Tommasini

    • Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory

  • Daniel S Clark

    • Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory
    • LLNL

  • Kevin L Baker

    • Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory

  • Alex A Do

    • Lawrence Livermore Natl Lab
    • Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory

  • Otto L Landen

    • Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory
    • Lawrence Livermore National Lab

  • Vladimir A Smalyuk

    • Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory

  • Christopher R Weber

    • Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory

  • Benjamin Bachmann

    • Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory

  • Laurent Divol

    • Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory

  • Tina Ebert

    • Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory

  • Gareth N Hall

    • Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory

  • Ed V Marley

    • Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory

  • Edward P Hartouni

    • Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory

  • Shaun M Kerr

    • Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory

  • Shahab Khan

    • Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory

  • Christine M Krauland

    • Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory

  • Andrea L Kritcher

    • Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory

  • Marius Millot

    • Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory

  • Alastair S Moore

    • Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory

  • Ryan C Nora

    • Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory

  • Arthur E Pak

    • Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory

  • Sonja Rogers

    • Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory

  • Michael S Rubery

    • Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory

  • David Schlossberg

    • Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory
    • Lawrence Livermore National Lab

  • David Jerome Strozzi

    • Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory
    • LLNL

  • Matthew Peter Selwood

    • Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory

  • Brandon Woodworth

    • Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory

  • Travis M Briggs

    • Lawrence Livemore National Laboratory

  • Dean M Holunga

    • Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory

  • Abbas Nikroo

    • Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory

  • Michael Stadermann

    • Lawrence Livermore Natl Lab