Quantitative x-ray imager (abstract)

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We report on development of a quantitative x-ray imager (QXI) for the national Inertial Confinement Fusion Program. Included in this development is a study of photocathode response as a function of photon energy, 2–17.5 keV, which is related to diagnostic development on the National Ignition Facility (NIF). The QXI is defined as being a quantative imager due to the repeated characterization. This instrument is systematically checked out, electronically as well as its photocathode x-ray response, both on a direct current and pulsed x-ray sources, before and after its use on a shot campaign. The QXI is a gated x-ray imager1 used for a variety of experiments conducted in the Inertial Confinement Fusion and Radiation Physics Program. The camera was assembled in Los Alamos and has been under development since 1997 and has now become the workhorse framing camera by the program. The electronics were built by Grant Applied Physics of San Fransisco, CA.2 The QXI has been used at the LANL Trident, LLNL Nova, and University of Rochester Laboratory OMEGA laser facilities. The camera consists of a grated microchannel plate (MCP), a phosphor coated fiberoptic faceplate coupled to film for data readout, along with high speed electronic pulsers to drive the x-ray detector. The QXI has both a two-strip and a four-strip detection head and has the ability to individually bias the gain of each of the strips. The timing of the QXI was done at the Trident short pulse laboratory, using 211 nm light. Single strip jitter was looked at as well and determined to be <25 ps. Flatfielding of the photocathode across the MCP was done with the Trident main laser with 150 J on a gold disk with a 1 ns. Spatial resolution was determined to be <5 μm by using the same laser conditions as before and a backlit 1000 lp/in. grid. The QXI has been used on cylindrical implosion work at the Nova Laser Facility, and on direct-drive cylinder mix and indirect-drive high convergence implosion experiments at OMEGA. Its two-strip module has provided the capability to look at point backlighters, as part of technique development for experiments on the NIF. Its next use will be in March 2000 with its off axis viewer nose at Omega, providing a perpendicular view of Rayleigh–Taylor spike dissipation.