Thomas Boehly

Dr. Boehly is in the High-Energy-Density Physics Experiments Group at the University of Rochester’s Laboratory for Laser Energetics (LLE).

He received an M.S. degree in Electrical Engineering from State University New York, Buffalo, and both an M.S. and Ph.D. in Mechanical Engineering (Plasma Physics) from the University of Rochester. After finishing his Ph.D. in 1985, Dr. Boehly had a one-year appointment as visiting researcher at the Institute of Laser Engineering at the University of Osaka. Since 1986, he has worked at LLE. In 2017 he had a three-month appointment at Ecole Polytechnique, Palaiseau France.

Dr. Boehly managed experiments on the single-beam Glass Development Laser (GDL) laser where he demonstrated a Ni-like Ti x‑ray laser and studied alternative x‑ray laser configurations. He was the chief engineer for the OMEGA 60-beam Laser upgrade project and performed experiments on beam smoothing, laser imprinting, laser-driven ablation, and hydrodynamic instabilities on the completed system. In collaboration with the Shock Physics Group at LLNL, he has led experiments using shock waves and ramp compression to study the behavior of materials compressed to extreme pressures (>1 Mbar) since 2001. He led the multi-laboratory effort that developed the highly successful shock-timing technique used for ignition targets at the National Ignition Facility and cryogenic implosions on the OMEGA laser. He received LLNL awards for his work on double-shocked deuterium and the development of the shock-timing method. He supervises the Ph.D. thesis projects for various graduate students.