Enhancing soft X-ray emission with depleted uranium in neon plasma focus

Abstract

Depleted uranium (U 238 ) is used for pre-ionization in the neon gas to study the soft X-ray emission in a Mather type plasma focus of 3.3 kJ. The X-rays are detected using an assembly of Quantrad Si pin diodes, masked with differential Ross fitters, and with a multi pinhole camera. The X-ray yield and pinhole images are found strongly influenced by the preionization and the pressure of the working gas. The soft X-ray yield of 82.5 ± 4.0 J in 1.3-1.56 keV energy window is obtained in the case of preionization of neon gas at the optimum pressure of 5 mbar, leading to the conversion efficiency of 2.5% of the stored energy. The total yield with preionization is 195 ± 9.0 J in 4π geometry measured at the optimum pressure of 5 mbar giving conversion efficiency of 5.9%. The time integrated images indicate the broadening of X-ray emission zone with preionization.