Quasi-isentropic compressibility of a strongly nonideal deuterium plasma at pressures of up to 5500 GPa: Nonideality and degeneracy effects

Abstract

We report on the experimental results on the quasi-isentropic compressibility of a strongly nonideal deuterium plasma that have been obtained on setups of cylindrical and spherical geometries in the pressure range of up to P ≈ 5500 GPa. We describe the characteristics of experimental setups, as well as the methods for the diagnostics and interpretation of the experimental results. The trajectory of metal shells that compress the deuterium plasma was detected using powerful pulsed X-ray sources with a maximal electron energy of up to 60 MeV. The values of the plasma density, which varied from ρ ≈ 0.8 g/cm3 to ρ ≈ 6 g/cm3, which corresponds to pressure P ≈ 5500 GPa (55 Mbar), were determined from the measured value of the shell radius at the instant that it was stopped. The pressure of the compressed plasma was determined using gasdynamic calculations taking into account the actual characteristics of the experimental setups. We have obtained a strongly compressed deuterium plasma in which electron degeneracy effects under the conditions of strong interparticle interaction are significant. The experimental results have been compared with the theoretical models of a strongly nonideal partly degenerate plasma. We have obtained experimental confirmation of the plasma phase transition in the pressure range near 150 GPa (1.5 Mbar), which is in keeping with the conclusion concerning anomaly in the compressibility of the deuterium plasma drawn in [1].