Phase-Controlled Non-Uniformity Mitigation of Fuel Target Implosion in Heavy Ion Inertial Fusion

Abstract

The phase-controlled smoothing mechanism is applied to a direct-driven inertial fusion fuel target implosion in heavy ion inertial fusion (HIF). We have found a phase-controlled non-uniformity smoothing mechanism in plasmas <sup xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink">1</sup> . In inertial confinement fusion, the fuel target should be imploded uniformly to obtain a high compression of the fusion DT fuel in order to reduce an input driver energy. The DT fuel density reaches about a thousand times the solid density. The fuel implosion uniformity requirement is stringent, and the implosion acceleration non-uniformity should be less than a few %. The phase-controlled non-uniformity is realized in the HIF fuel target implosion by the wobbling heavy ion beams (HIBs), and the implosion non-uniformity is successfully mitigated in HIF. In plasmas it would be difficult to measure the non-uniformity phase and amplitude. However, if the HIBs illumination non-uniformity may be oscillated, and the fuel target implosion non-uniformity would be controlled. The superimposition of the driver HIBs non-uniformity mitigates the original driver non-uniformity in the HIF target implosion <sup xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink">1</sup> .