Blast wave radiation source measurement experiments on the Z Z-pinch facility

Abstract

The Dynamic Hohlraum (DH) radiation on the Z facility at Sandia National Laboratories [R. B. Spielman, W. A. Stygar, J. F. Seamen et al., Proceeding of the 11th International Pulsed Power Conference, Baltimore, 1997, edited by G. Cooperstein and I. Vitkovitsky (IEEE, Piscataway, NJ, 1997), Vol. 1, p. 709] is a bright source of radiant energy that has proven useful for high energy density physics experiments. But the radiation output from a DH on Z needs to be well known. In this paper, a new method is presented for measuring the radiation fluence deposited in an experiment, specifically, an experiment driven by a Z DH. This technique uses a blast wave produced in a SiO2 foam, which starts as supersonic but transitions to subsonic, producing a shock at the transition point that is observable via radiography. The position of this shock is a sensitive measure of the radiation drive energy from the Z DH. Computer simulations have been used to design and analyze a Z foam blast wave experiment.