RESUMEN
In this study, we present the absolute calibration of the conical crystal for the zinc spectrometer (ZSPEC), an x-ray spectrometer at the OMEGA laser facility at the Laboratory for Laser Energetics. The ZSPEC was originally designed to measure x-ray Thomson scattering using flat or cylindrically curved highly oriented pyrolytic graphite crystals centered around Zn He-alpha emission at 9 keV. To improve the useful spectral range and collection efficiency of the ZSPEC, a conical highly annealed pyrolytic graphite crystal was fabricated for the ZSPEC. The conically bent crystal in the Hall geometry produces a line focus perpendicular to the spectrometer axis, corresponding to the detector plane of electronic detectors at large scale laser facilities such as OMEGA, extending the useful range of the spectrometer to 7-11 keV. Using data collected using a microfocus Mo x-ray source, we determine important characteristics of ZSPEC such as the dispersion, spatial resolution, and absolute sensitivity of the instrument. A ray-trace model of ZSPEC provides another point of agreement in calculations of the ZSPEC dispersion and crystal response.
RESUMEN
The temperature of laser-driven shock waves is of interest to inertial confinement fusion and high-energy-density physics. We report on a streaked optical pyrometer that measures the self-emission of laser-driven shocks simultaneously with a velocity interferometer system for any reflector (VISAR). Together these diagnostics are used to obtain the temporally and spatially resolved temperatures of approximately megabar shocks driven by the OMEGA laser. We provide a brief description of the diagnostic and how it is used with VISAR. Key spectral calibration results are discussed and important characteristics of the recording system are presented.
RESUMEN
A method of obtaining powder diffraction data on dynamically compressed solids has been implemented at the Jupiter and OMEGA laser facilities. Thin powdered samples are sandwiched between diamond plates and ramp compressed in the solid phase using a gradual increase in the drive-laser intensity. The pressure history in the sample is determined by back-propagation of the measured diamond free-surface velocity. A pulse of x rays is produced at the time of peak pressure by laser illumination of a thin Cu or Fe foil and collimated at the sample plane by a pinhole cut in a Ta substrate. The diffracted signal is recorded on x-ray sensitive material, with a typical d-spacing uncertainty of ~0.01 Å. This diagnostic has been used up to 0.9 TPa (9 Mbar) to verify the solidity, measure the density, constrain the crystal structure, and evaluate the strain-induced texturing of a variety of compressed samples spanning atomic numbers from 6 (carbon) to 82 (lead). Further refinement of the technique will soon enable diffraction measurements in solid samples at pressures exceeding 1 TPa.
RESUMEN
Velocity interferometers are typically used to measure velocities of surfaces at a single point or along an imaged line as a function of time. We describe an optical arrangement that enables high-resolution measurements of the two-dimensional velocity field across a shock front or shocked interface. The technique is employed to measure microscopic fluctuations in shock fronts that have passed through materials being considered as ablators for indirect-drive inertial confinement fusion. With picosecond time resolution the instrument captures velocity modes with wavelengths as short as 2.5 microm at a resolution of approximately 10 m/s rms on velocity fields averaging many km/s over an 800 microm field of view.
RESUMEN
The velocity and remaining ablator mass of an imploding capsule are critical metrics for assessing the progress toward ignition of an inertially confined fusion experiment. These and other ablator rocket parameters have been measured using a single streaked x-ray radiograph. A regularization technique has been used to determine the ablator density profile ρ(r) at each time step; moments of ρ(r) then provide the areal density, average radius, and mass of the unablated, or remaining, ablator material, with the velocity determined from the time derivative of the average radius. The technique has been implemented on experiments at the OMEGA laser facility.
RESUMEN
In experiments at the National Ignition Facility (NIF), the near backscatter imager materials need to maintain high optical transmission while exposed to hohlraum generated x rays. Glass plates are incorporated in the design to protect the optical scattering plates from x-ray damage. Radiation environments spanning those expected on NIF have been produced at the Omega Laser Facility by symmetric laser illumination of 1 mm sized gold spheres. The time-dependent ultraviolet transmission of sample glass plates was measured. The data are interpreted with a free electron absorption model. Combined with the simulations of the hohlraum x-ray emission, this model is used to predict the transmission of the glass plates on the NIF. We predict that the plates should perform adequately up to the peak of the laser pulse.