Generation of plane shocks using intense heavy ion beams: Application to Richtmyer–Meshkov instability growth studies

Abstract

A design of a novel experiment that allows the generation of a well defined, steady, and strong plane shock wave employing an intense uranium ion beam that is incident on a wedge shaped compound target is presented. This technique will open up the possibility of carrying out unique high energy density physics experiments using these shock waves. One such experiment is to study the growth of Richtmyer–Meshkov instability in fluids as well as in solids, both in the linear and nonlinear regimes, as shown by detailed numerical simulations presented in this paper. The ion beam parameters used in this study correspond to those that will be available at the Facility for Antiprotons and Ion Research (FAIR) at Darmstadt.