259 research outputs found
Kinetic-Ion Simulations Addressing Whether Ion Trapping Inflates Stimulated Brillouin Backscattering Reflectivities
An investigation of the possible inflation of stimulated Brillouin
backscattering (SBS) due to ion kinetic effects is presented using
electromagnetic particle simulations and integrations of three-wave
coupled-mode equations with linear and nonlinear models of the nonlinear ion
physics. Electrostatic simulations of linear ion Landau damping in an ion
acoustic wave, nonlinear reduction of damping due to ion trapping, and
nonlinear frequency shifts due to ion trapping establish a baseline for
modeling the electromagnetic SBS simulations. Systematic scans of the laser
intensity have been undertaken with both one-dimensional particle simulations
and coupled-mode-equations integrations, and two values of the electron-to-ion
temperature ratio (to vary the linear ion Landau damping) are considered. Three
of the four intensity scans have evidence of SBS inflation as determined by
observing more reflectivity in the particle simulations than in the
corresponding three-wave mode-coupling integrations with a linear ion-wave
model, and the particle simulations show evidence of ion trapping.Comment: 56 pages, 20 figure
Focusing of Intense Subpicosecond Laser Pulses in Wedge Targets
Two dimensional particle-in-cell simulations characterizing the interaction
of ultraintense short pulse lasers in the range 10^{18} \leq I \leq 10^{20}
W/cm^{2} with converging target geometries are presented. Seeking to examine
intensity amplification in high-power laser systems, where focal spots are
typically non-diffraction limited, we describe key dynamical features as the
injected laser intensity and convergence angle of the target are systematically
varied. We find that laser pulses are focused down to a wavelength with the
peak intensity amplified by an order of magnitude beyond its vacuum value, and
develop a simple model for how the peak location moves back towards the
injection plane over time. This performance is sustained over hundreds of
femtoseconds and scales to laser intensities beyond 10^{20} W/cm^{2} at 1 \mu m
wavelength.Comment: 5 pages, 6 figures, accepted for publication in Physics of Plasma
Collisionless shock acceleration of narrow energy spread ion beams from mixed species plasmas using 1 m lasers
Collisionless shock acceleration of protons and C ions has been
achieved by the interaction of a 10 W/cm, 1 m laser with a
near-critical density plasma. Ablation of the initially solid density target by
a secondary laser allowed for systematic control of the plasma profile. This
enabled the production of beams with peaked spectra with energies of 10-18
MeV/a.m.u. and energy spreads of 10-20 with up to 3x10 particles within
these narrow spectral features. The narrow energy spread and similar velocity
of ion species with different charge-to-mass ratio are consistent with
acceleration by the moving potential of a shock wave. Particle-in-cell
simulations show shock accelerated beams of protons and C ions with
energy distributions consistent with the experiments. Simulations further
indicate the plasma profile determines the trade-off between the beam charge
and energy and that with additional target optimization narrow energy spread
beams exceeding 100 MeV/a.m.u. can be produced using the same laser conditions.Comment: Accepted for publication in Physical Review Accelerators and Beam
Fast-ignition design transport studies: realistic electron source, integrated PIC-hydrodynamics, imposed magnetic fields
Transport modeling of idealized, cone-guided fast ignition targets indicates
the severe challenge posed by fast-electron source divergence. The hybrid
particle-in-cell [PIC] code Zuma is run in tandem with the
radiation-hydrodynamics code Hydra to model fast-electron propagation, fuel
heating, and thermonuclear burn. The fast electron source is based on a 3D
explicit-PIC laser-plasma simulation with the PSC code. This shows a quasi
two-temperature energy spectrum, and a divergent angle spectrum (average
velocity-space polar angle of 52 degrees). Transport simulations with the
PIC-based divergence do not ignite for > 1 MJ of fast-electron energy, for a
modest 70 micron standoff distance from fast-electron injection to the dense
fuel. However, artificially collimating the source gives an ignition energy of
132 kJ. To mitigate the divergence, we consider imposed axial magnetic fields.
Uniform fields ~50 MG are sufficient to recover the artificially collimated
ignition energy. Experiments at the Omega laser facility have generated fields
of this magnitude by imploding a capsule in seed fields of 50-100 kG. Such
imploded fields are however more compressed in the transport region than in the
laser absorption region. When fast electrons encounter increasing field
strength, magnetic mirroring can reflect a substantial fraction of them and
reduce coupling to the fuel. A hollow magnetic pipe, which peaks at a finite
radius, is presented as one field configuration which circumvents mirroring.Comment: 16 pages, 17 figures, submitted to Phys. Plasma
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Effects of Ion-Ion Collisions and Inhomogeneity in Two-Dimensional Kinetic Ion Simulations of Stimulated Brillouin Backscattering
Two-dimensional simulations with the BZOHAR [B.I. Cohen, B.F. Lasinski, A.B. Langdon, and E.A. Williams, Phys. Plasmas 4, 956 (1997)] hybrid code (kinetic particle ions and Boltzmann fluid electrons) have been used to investigate the saturation of stimulated Brillouin backscatter (SBBS) instability including the effects of ion-ion collisions and inhomogeneity. Ion-ion collisions tend to increase ion-wave dissipation, which decreases the gain exponent for stimulated Brillouin backscattering; and the peak Brillouin backscatter reflectivities tend to decrease with increasing collisionality in the simulations. Two types of Langevin-operator, ion-ion collision models were implemented in the simulations. In both models used the collisions are functions of the local ion temperature and density, but the collisions have no velocity dependence in the first model. In the second model, the collisions are also functions of the energy of the ion that is being scattered so as to represent a Fokker-Planck collision operator. Collisions decorrelate the ions from the acoustic waves in SBS, which disrupts ion trapping in the acoustic wave. Nevertheless, ion trapping leading to a hot ion tail and two-dimensional physics that allows the SBS ion waves to nonlinearly scatter remain robust saturation mechanisms for SBBS in a high-gain limit over a range of ion collisionality. SBS backscatter in the presence of a spatially nonuniform plasma flow is also investigated. Simulations show that depending on the sign of the spatial gradient of the flow relative to the backscatter, ion trapping effects that produce a nonlinear frequency shift can enhance (auto-resonance) or decrease (anti-auto-resonance) reflectivities in agreement with theoretical arguments
Cone-Guided Fast Ignition with no Imposed Magnetic Fields
Simulations of ignition-scale fast ignition targets have been performed with
the new integrated Zuma-Hydra PIC-hydrodynamic capability. We consider an
idealized spherical DT fuel assembly with a carbon cone, and an
artificially-collimated fast electron source. We study the role of E and B
fields and the fast electron energy spectrum. For mono-energetic 1.5 MeV fast
electrons, without E and B fields, the energy needed for ignition is E_f^{ig} =
30 kJ. This is about 3.5x the minimal deposited ignition energy of 8.7 kJ for
our fuel density of 450 g/cm^3. Including E and B fields with the resistive
Ohm's law E = \eta J_b gives E_f^{ig} = 20 kJ, while using the full Ohm's law
gives E_f^{ig} > 40 kJ. This is due to magnetic self-guiding in the former
case, and \nabla n \times \nabla T magnetic fields in the latter. Using a
realistic, quasi two-temperature energy spectrum derived from PIC laser-plasma
simulations increases E_f^{ig} to (102, 81, 162) kJ for (no E/B, E = \eta J_b,
full Ohm's law). This stems from the electrons being too energetic to fully
stop in the optimal hot spot depth.Comment: Minor revisions in response to referee comment
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Predictive three dimensional modeling of Stimulated Brillouin Scattering in ignition-scale experiments
The first three-dimensional (3D) simulations of a high power 0.351 {micro}m laser beam propagating through a high temperature hohlraum plasma are reported. We show that 3D linear kinetic modeling of Stimulated Brillouin scattering reproduces quantitatively the experimental measurements, provided it is coupled to detailed hydrodynamics simulation and a realistic description of the laser beam from its millimeter-size envelop down to the micron scale speckles. These simulations accurately predict the strong reduction of SBS measured when polarization smoothing is used
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