LMJ 2023 facility status

Abstract

The Laser Megajoule facility, developed by the CEA is based on 176 Nd:glass laser beams focused on a micro-target positioned inside a 10-meter diameter spherical chamber. The facility will deliver a total energy of 1.4MJ of UV light at 0.35 µm and a maximum power of 400 TW. A specific pétawatt beam, PETAL, offers a combination of a very high intensity beam, synchronized with the nanosecond beams of the LMJ. This combination allows expanding the LMJ experimental field in the High Energy Density Physics (HEDP) domain.Since September 2021, a major project milestone has been achieved with the commissioning of the half LMJ (88 beams are fully operational with 10 heating bundles of 8 beams and a specific bundle for plasma diagnostics purpose). The installation and the commissioning of new laser bundles and new plasma diagnostics around the target chamber are continuing, simultaneously to the realization of plasma experiments.Another project milestone has been achieved at the end of 2021, with a dedicated laser experiment in the facility to explore the Power-Energy Diagram.

Analysis of mid-spatial frequency wavefront distortions from a liquid-cooled flash-lamp pumped Nd:phosphate laser amplifier

“…High-power laser facilities can be mostly divided into two classes of systems [1] , with (i) energetic/low-repetition-rate systems on one hand for facilities, such as the National Ignition Facility (NIF) [2] or Laser Megajoule (LMJ) [3] , and (ii) low-energy/high-power/high-repetition-rate systems on the other hand [4][5][6] . However, the past decade has been marked by numerous efforts to populate the intermediate 100 J to kJ energy/high-power/high-repetition-rate class.…”

Spectral Failsafe System of High-Power Laser Using Dual Fiber Bragg Gratings

“…One far-reaching potential application of high-power lasers is inertial confinement fusion (ICF), where nuclear fusion reactions are initiated by heating and compressing a deuterium-tritium (DT) target with high-power nanosecond lasers [4,5]. Large-scale high-power laser facilities designed as ICF drivers have been developed rapidly in the last decades, such as the National Ignition Facility (NIF) at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL) in America [6,7], the Laser Megajoule (LMJ) in France [8], and the SG-series laser facility in China [3,9].…”