Precision equation-of-state measurements on National Ignition Facility ablator materials from 1 to 12 Mbar using laser-driven shock waves

Abstract

A large uncertainty in the design of ignition capsules for use in the National Ignition Campaign (NIC) is the ablator equation of state. In this article, we report equation-of-state measurements for two candidate NIC ablator materials, glow-discharge polymer (GDP), and germanium-doped GDP. These materials were driven to pressures of 1 to 12 Mbar using laser-driven shock waves. Hugoniot measurements were obtained using the impedance matching technique with an α-quartz standard. This article presents the first kinematic measurements in the high-pressure fluid regime for these materials, which show to be in close agreement with Livermore equation-of-state model predictions.