PROCYON: 18-MJ, 2-μs pulsed power system

Abstract

The Procyon high explosive pulsed power (HEPP) system was designed to drive plasma Z-pinch experiments that produce Megajoule soft X-ray pulses when the plasma stagnates on axis. In the proceedings of the Ninth IEEE Pulsed Power Conference, the authors published results from system development tests. At this time, they have fielded seven tests in which the focus was on either vacuum switching or load physics. Four of the tests concentrated on the performance of a plasma flow switch (PFS) which employed a l/r mass distribution in the PFS barrel. Of the four tests, two had dummy loads and one had an implosion load. In addition, one of the tests broke down near the vacuum dielectric interface, and the result demonstrated what Procyon could deliver to an 18 nH load. The authors summarize PFS results and the 18 nH test which is pertinent to upcoming solid/liquid liner experiments. On their other three tests, they eliminated the PFS switching and powered the Z-pinch directly with the HEPP system. From the best of these direct drive tests, they obtained 1.5 MJ of radiation in a 250 ns pulse, their best radiation pulse to date. They also summarize direct drive test results. More details are given in other papers in this conference for both the PFS and direct drive experiments, and an updated analysis of their opening switch performance is also included. The remainder of this paper describes the parameters and capabilities of their system, and they use the data from several experiments to provide more precise information than previously available.