Spherical Rayleigh-Taylor growth of three-dimensional broadband perturbations on OMEGA

V. A. Smalyuk, S. X. Hu, J. D. Hager, J. A. Delettrez, D. D. Meyerhofer, T. C. Sangster, D. Shvarts

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21 Scopus citations

Abstract

Spherical Rayleigh-Taylor (RT) growth experiments of three-dimensional (3D) broadband nonuniformities were conducted in the acceleration phase of spherical implosions on OMEGA [T. R. Boehly, Opt. Commun. 133, 495 (1997)]. The targets consisted of 20- and 24-μm -thick plastic spherical shells having diagnostic openings for backlighter x rays to image shell modulations. Experiments were conducted with square laser pulses at a low drive intensity of ∼2 × 1014 W/cm2, high drive intensity of ∼1 × 10 15 W/cm2, and a shaped pulse consisting of a low-intensity foot and high-intensity drive part (peak intensity of ∼1 × 10 15 W/cm2). In low-intensity experiments, large RT growth was measured, resulting in shells being broken up by 3D modulations at the end of the drive. In the high-intensity experiments, no RT growth of the 3D modulations was detected. In the shaped-pulse experiments, perturbations grew during the low-intensity part of the drive and were stabilized later during the high-intensity part of the drive. The measured RT growth stabilization with the high-intensity drive was similar to previous observations in planar geometry [V. A. Smalyuk, Phys. Rev. Lett. 101, 025002 (2008)].

Original languageEnglish
Article number112701
Pages (from-to)112701
Number of pages1
JournalPhysics of Plasmas
Volume16
Issue number11
DOIs
StatePublished - 1 Jan 2009
Externally publishedYes

ASJC Scopus subject areas

  • Condensed Matter Physics

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