Laser direct-driven Rayleigh-Taylor strength measurements of solid tin at 150 GPa

We study strength of tin (Sn) with Rayleigh-Taylor (RT) instability strength experiments on the Omega EP laser facility. The RT growth of pre-imposed ripples at the pusher-sample interface is measured with face-on x-ray radiography at peak conditions of 150 GPa and 1500 K. Simulations with the commonly used Steinberg-Guinan strength model are compared with experimental results for extracting the Sn strength. Use of epoxy as the pusher material leads to lower RT growth than is expected by simulations. To resolve this discrepancy, we test three different types of the pusher-sample pairs which are comprised of not epoxy, but of metals (Al, Sn, and Au). The relative strengths of the metal pairs are deconvoluted to obtain the strength of each material.