Physics Of ICF Related Multiwire Array Implosion

At the present time an investigation into the process of current-driven implosion of cylindrical tungsten wire arrays is under way as applied to the ICF research The investigations performed at the Angara-5-1 facility have shown that after first several nanoseconds of current flowing plasma is generated on the surface of a wire and the current from the wire is switched to the plasma corona. The system includes low density plasma and a dense core. The core keeps its initial position for a significant period of the liner pulse duration and serves as a stationary plasma source. The plasma being continuously generated is accelerated to the liner axis by Ampere's force. This plasma is considerably thick and transfers some fraction of the current. For a better understanding of physics of the wire array implosion process of great interest are investigations into the spatial mass and current distributions inside the array during this process. The current work deals with these investigations performed at the Angara-5-1 facility and presented in three sections: current distribution inside the array during implosion, plasma density distribution during implosion using a method of X-ray probing, electron density distribution during stagnation using a laser interferometer