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To Ignition to Ignition ON THE PATH TO IGNITION 10 S&TR March 2013 National Ignition Campaign National Ignition Facility experiments produce new states of matter as scientists close in on creating the conditions required to ignite fusion fuel. MONG the most challenging scientific closer to achieving ignition and fulfilling A quests over the past 50 years has the vision of early fusion pioneers such as been the international effort to create, in former Laboratory Director John Nuckolls. a laboratory setting, a miniature “star on Shortly after the laser’s invention in 1960, Earth.” The goal of this endeavor is to Nuckolls conceived of using the x rays surpass the extreme mix of temperature, generated by a powerful laser pulse to fuse density, and pressure at the center of the hydrogen isotopes, convert matter into Sun and generate conditions in which energy (as in Einstein’s famous equation, hydrogen fusion reactions can start and E = mc2), and thereby liberate more energy sustain themselves, thus creating a fusion than is delivered by the laser pulse. fire in the laboratory. The ongoing fusion “NIF was designed to be the world’s reaction in the Sun’s center provides largest laser,” says NIF chief scientist John all the energy needed for life on Earth. Lindl. “In fact, it now operates as such. Replicating this sustained reaction in a We have known from the outset that the laboratory requires conditions that are even energy it delivers does not give us a large more extreme: temperatures in the tens of margin of performance to achieve ignition. millions of degrees, pressures hundreds Everything that occurs during the implosion of billions of times Earth’s atmosphere, of hydrogen fuel must be nearly perfect.” and a density of burning matter that is Lindl notes that significant progress has more than 100 times the density of lead. been made since precision experiments In their quest to bring “star power” to began in May 2011, as part of the National Earth, researchers at the National Ignition Ignition Campaign (NIC). (See the box Facility (NIF) have worked over the past on p. 12.) He attributes that success to 18 months to produce states of matter the heroic efforts of the entire NIF staff. never before achieved in a laboratory “In all areas of the organization—lasers, setting. Using all 192 beams of the giant diagnostics, cryogenics, and operations— laser, experimenters are generating people have worked incredibly hard and temperatures and densities inside an with incredible skill. As a result, we imploding, peppercorn-size capsule of have made huge advances in technology, frozen hydrogen isotopes (deuterium and materials, and scientific understanding. tritium, or D–T) that when compressed to We have come a long way and routinely the diameter of a human hair will sustain achieve environments that are extreme by fusion burn. any measure.” Edward Moses, principal associate director for NIF and Photon Science and Indirect Drive Heats the Fuel leader of the fusion program effort, says, To achieve the extreme conditions “The ultimate goal of these experiments required for fusion, NIF’s 192 laser beams is to ignite a self-sustaining burn wave of are focused into laser entrance holes at fusion fuel, producing more energy than each end of a 1-centimeter-long cylindrical is delivered to the target—an event called target, called a hohlraum. The laser ignition.” NIF researchers are moving ever beams irradiate the interior surface of the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory 11 National Ignition Campaign S&TR March 2013 hohlraum, raising the interior temperature volume of the capsule collapses by almost a conditions are hotter and nearly as dense as to more than 3 million degrees Celsius. factor of 100,000, heating and compressing those in the center of the Sun. At these temperatures, the hohlraum the frozen D–T ice layer, the fuel for The hot spot is surrounded by a works much like an oven, radiating x rays ignition, lying just inside the outer plastic region containing about 90 percent of into its own interior. The x rays in turn layer. In experiments to date, the resulting the fusion fuel, which has a density of irradiate the plastic shell of the fuel capsule hot center, called the hot spot, reaches 600 to 800 grams per cubic centimeter at mounted in the hohlraum’s center, ablating temperatures of nearly 40 million degrees a temperature of 1 to 2 million degrees the surface and causing the capsule to Celsius with densities of 50 to 100 grams Celsius. The fuel’s density is about implode through a rocketlike reaction. per cubic centimeter (5 to 10 times the 3,000 times the initial density of the X-ray and neutron emission images from density of lead) and pressures 150 to frozen D–T layer—well in excess of that ignition experiments show that the interior 200 billion times Earth’s atmosphere. These in the Sun’s center and by far the highest The National Ignition Campaign Ignition experiments on the National Ignition Facility (NIF) began achieved in the laboratory, they remain a factor of two to three below as part of the National Nuclear Security Administration’s (NNSA’s) those needed for ignition. National Ignition Campaign (NIC). This campaign, which began in Over the course of NIC, a large body of scientific knowledge 2006 and ended September 30, 2012, had two principal goals: transition and major new experimental, diagnostic, and target manufacturing NIF to routine operations as the world’s preeminent high-energy-density capabilities were developed and validated. NIF scientists and engineers user facility for the nuclear weapons programs, fundamental science, steadily increased the laser’s energy and power, culminating on July 5, nonproliferation, and other national security purposes and develop the 2012, when the system’s 192 beams delivered more than 1.8 megajoules capability to study and achieve ignition on NIF. The campaign involved of ultraviolet light (in excess of 50 times more energy than any laser the participation of Sandia and Los Alamos national laboratories, has demonstrated) and more than 500 trillion watts of power to the General Atomics, and the Laboratory center of the target chamber. (See S&TR, for Laser Energetics at the University of September 2012, p. 2.) The combination 2012 Rochester. Other key contributors included 500 of energy and power, along with the the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, 2011 precision of laser beam pointing and Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, power balance of all the beams, met Atomic Weapons Establishment in 400 the NIC specifications. International England, and the French Commissariat à 2010 review committees have agreed that l’Énergie Atomique. the laser has proven exceptionally 300 Following completion of NIF reliable, durable, precise, and flexible in construction in March 2009, researchers 2009 accommodating the unusually diverse focused on installing, qualifying, and 200 needs of various research groups. integrating the facility’s many systems An NNSA report to Congress in as well as developing the experimental December 2012 stated that “The NIF platforms necessary to study and 100 laser performed reliably and with great Power at target, trillion watts control, with adequate precision, the precision and executed thirty-seven key processes necessary for achieving Nova, OMEGA lasers cryogenic implosion experiments. Power ignition. (See S&TR, September 2012, 0 and energy have exceeded initial design 0 0.5 1.0 1.5 2.0 pp. 14–21.) Precision implosion- specifications. Target quality is superb, optimization experiments using these Energy at target, megajoules and diagnostics have been developed platforms steadily increased the pressure that are returning experimental data of in the frozen hydrogen fuel from about Scientists have steadily raised the power and unprecedented quality.” 1,000 terapascals (or nearly 10 billion energy levels at the National Ignition Facility The report added, “The pursuit of times atmospheric pressure) in the (NIF) since it was completed in September ignition and high fusion yields in the early implosions to currently about laboratory is a major objective of the 2009. On July 5, 2012, the laser system’s 15,000 terapascals, achieving densities in SSP [Stockpile Stewardship Program] 192 beams delivered more than 1.8 megajoules excess of 600 grams per cubic centimeter and ICF [Inertial Confinement Fusion] or about 60 times the density of lead. of ultraviolet (3-omega) light and more than Program and is a grand challenge Although the pressures achieved are 500 trillion watts of power to a target. This scientific problem that tests our codes, approaching those in the center of the unprecedented combination of energy and our people, our facilities, and our Sun and are by far the highest ever power met NIF’s original design specifications. integrated capabilities.” 12 Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory S&TR March 2013 National Ignition Campaign 3 density ever achieved in laboratory NIF researchers are continuing to work experiments. on elevating the hot-spot temperature and The goal of current experiments density through increased alpha heating to is to increase the hot-spot density by improve deuterium–tritium (D–T) yield. The another factor of three at about the same 2 yield attained in current experiments is temperature already being achieved. Under about 50 times greater than that achieved these conditions, the fusion reaction rate on the first cryo-layered experiment in would be sufficient to generate ignition, 2010 and is within a factor of 5 to 10 of the yield needed to initiate ignition. or burn conditions. The precursor step 1 to ignition is attaining measurable alpha D–T yield, kilojoules heating, in which the helium nuclei (alpha particles) produced by the fusing of deuterium and tritium nuclei deposit enough kinetic energy to increase the fuel’s 0 0 1 2 3 temperature well above that produced Hot-spot energy, kilojoules by the laser-generated implosion alone.
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