StarDriver: A Flexible Laser Driver for Inertial Confinement Fusion and High Energy Density Physics

Eimerl, D.; Campbell, E. M.; Krupke, William F.; Zweiback, J.; Kruer, W. L.; Marozas, J.A.; Zuegel, J. D.; Myatt, J. F.; Kelly, John; Froula, D. H.; McCrory, R. L.

doi:10.1007/s10894-014-9697-2

Cited by 28 publications

(17 citation statements)

References 34 publications

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“…Future laser drivers for inertial confinement fusion such as StarDriver [75] aim to control both laser plasma instabilities and hydrodynamic instabilities by using multiple beamlets with bandwidths in the range 2%-10%. Lasers with bandwidths of 2% and repetition rates of 10Hz are already becoming available using Neodymium phosphate glass [75] and it is anticipated that this can be increased by using a range of laser gain media, such as a selection of Nd:Glass media based on phosphates, silicates and fluorides. Addition of other gain media such as Yb or Er glasses can potentially produce bandwidths up to 10% [75].…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Lasers with bandwidths of 2% and repetition rates of 10Hz are already becoming available using Neodymium phosphate glass [75] and it is anticipated that this can be increased by using a range of laser gain media, such as a selection of Nd:Glass media based on phosphates, silicates and fluorides. Addition of other gain media such as Yb or Er glasses can potentially produce bandwidths up to 10% [75]. In this paper and our previous paper, where the GPK formalism was used to study bandwidth effects on Raman scattering [35], we demonstrated that lasers with bandwidths in this range significantly diminish the growth rate of both stimulated Brillouin and Raman backscatter.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Bandwidth effects in stimulated Brillouin scattering driven by partially incoherent light

Brandão,

Santos,

Trines

et al. 2021

Preprint

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A generalized Wigner-Moyal statistical theory of radiation is used to obtain a general dispersion relation for Stimulated Brillouin Scattering (SBS) driven by a broadband radiation field with arbitrary statistics. The monochromatic limit is recovered from our general result, reproducing the classic monochromatic dispersion relation. The behavior of the growth rate of the instability as a simultaneous function of the bandwidth of the pump wave, the intensity of the incident field and the wave number of the scattered wave is further explored by numerically solving the dispersion relation. Our results show that the growth rate of SBS can be reduced by 1/3 for a bandwidth of 0.3 nm, for typical experimental parameters.

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Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Bandwidth effects in stimulated Brillouin scattering driven by partially incoherent light

Brandão,

Santos,

Trines

et al. 2021

Preprint

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“…But DPSSLs are narrow bandwidth lasers. To produce the needed large laser bandwidth, there is a concept [23] to build a very large number of DPSSLs, each with its own different central frequency, each then converted to the third harmonic. Each small DPSSL would illuminate a different small section of a final focusing mirror, so that each mirror would, in total, contain several THz of bandwidth.…”

Section: A Diode-pumped Solid-state Laser Does Not Meet the Requiremementioning

confidence: 99%

The path to electrical energy using laser fusion

Bodner¹

2019

High Pow Laser Sci Eng

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Direct-drive laser fusion has one potential advantage over all other approaches to fusion energy. The hot plasma can be kept near or below the various plasma instability thresholds, if one uses purely spherical targets, with a short wavelength, large bandwidth and optically smoothed excimer laser. Instead of trying to manage laser-plasma instabilities, one avoids them. There is a path to complete the evaluation and development of this energy option, with moderate costs and a moderate time scale. Glass lasers, with their longer wavelength and narrower bandwidth, are no longer useful to evaluate fusion targets.

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“…Suppression of SBS usually relies on increasing the laser bandwidth using PM, which also requires compensating for the inevitable conversion of PM to amplitude modulation (AM) [18] . However, other non-PM methods to increase bandwidth have been explored [19] . Because insufficient PM bandwidth or outright failure of PM can lead to extensive damage, all kJ lasers that suppress SBS using PM employ some form of PM failsafe system [20] .…”

Section: Sbs Suppression Systemmentioning

confidence: 99%

Recent laser upgrades at Sandia’s Z-backlighter facility in order to accommodate new requirements for magnetized liner inertial fusion on the Z-machine

Schwarz

Rambo

Armstrong

et al. 2016

High Pow Laser Sci Eng

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The Z-backlighter laser facility primarily consists of two high energy, high-power laser systems. Z-Beamlet laser (ZBL) (Rambo et al., Appl. Opt. 44, 2421) is a multi-kJ-class, nanosecond laser operating at 1054 nm which is frequency doubled to 527 nm in order to provide x-ray backlighting of high energy density events on the Z-machine. Z-Petawatt (ZPW) (Schwarz et al., J. Phys.: Conf. Ser. 112, 032020 (2008)) is a petawatt-class system operating at 1054 nm delivering up to 500 J in 500 fs for backlighting and various short-pulse laser experiments (see also Figure 10 for a facility overview). With the development of the magnetized liner inertial fusion (MagLIF) concept on the Z-machine, the primary backlighting missions of ZBL and ZPW have been adjusted accordingly. As a result, we have focused our recent efforts on increasing the output energy of ZBL from 2 to 4 kJ at 527 nm by modifying the fiber front end to now include extra bandwidth (for stimulated Brillouin scattering suppression). The MagLIF concept requires a well-defined/behaved beam for interaction with the pressurized fuel. Hence we have made great efforts to implement an adaptive optics system on ZBL and have explored the use of phase plates. We are also exploring concepts to use ZPW as a backlighter for ZBL driven MagLIF experiments. Alternatively, ZPW could be used as an additional fusion fuel pre-heater or as a temporally flexible high energy pre-pulse. All of these concepts require the ability to operate the ZPW in a nanosecond long-pulse mode, in which the beam can co-propagate with ZBL. Some of the proposed modifications are complete and most of them are well on their way.

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StarDriver: A Flexible Laser Driver for Inertial Confinement Fusion and High Energy Density Physics

Cited by 28 publications

References 34 publications

Bandwidth effects in stimulated Brillouin scattering driven by partially incoherent light

Bandwidth effects in stimulated Brillouin scattering driven by partially incoherent light

The path to electrical energy using laser fusion

Recent laser upgrades at Sandia’s Z-backlighter facility in order to accommodate new requirements for magnetized liner inertial fusion on the Z-machine

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