NIF Polar Drive

2014:

In ICF implosions, nonuniformities seeded by both laser-imprint and initial shell-mass perturbations can grow as a result of hydrodynamic instabilities, such as the Richtmyer-Meshkov (RM) and Rayleigh-Taylor (RT) instabilities. This potentially results in a severe degradation of the target compression and neutron yield, and accurate modeling and understanding of nonuniformity growth at ignition-scale conditions is key for confidence in ignition designs. As part of LLE’s polar-direct-drive (PDD) campaign at the National Ignition Facility (NIF) to develop a direct-drive-ignition platform, LLE-led experiments were initiated on the NIF in 2014 to explore hydrodynamic instability growth in spherical, PDD implosion geometry.

Shown here is LLE scientist Matthias Hohenberger discussing a just-completed NIF (National Ignition Facility) polar-drive implosion