Abstract
This Letter presents results from the first fully integrated experiments testing the magnetized liner inertial fusion concept [S. A. Slutz et al., Phys. Plasmas 17, 056303 (2010)], in which a cylinder of deuterium gas with a preimposed 10 T axial magnetic field is heated by beamlet, a 2.5 kJ, 1 TW laser, and magnetically imploded by a 19 MA, 100 ns rise time current on the facility. Despite a predicted peak implosion velocity of only , the fuel reaches a stagnation temperature of approximately 3 keV, with , and produces up to thermonuclear deuterium-deuterium neutrons. X-ray emission indicates a hot fuel region with full width at half maximum ranging from 60 to over a 6 mm height and lasting approximately 2 ns. Greater than secondary deuterium-tritium neutrons were observed, indicating significant fuel magnetization given that the estimated radial areal density of the plasma is only .
- Received 18 June 2014
DOI:https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevLett.113.155003
© 2014 American Physical Society
Viewpoint
Magnetic Fields Lock in the Heat for Fusion
Published 14 October 2014
Sandia researchers demonstrate that magnetic fields help retain heat in an imploding pellet of fuel, increasing the number of fusion reactions.
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