Yang X., Miley G.H., Flippo K.A., Hora H.
University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, US
Keywords: deuteron beam, fast iginition, ICF, ultra-high-density deuterium cluster
There are a number of physics issues related to the traditional approach of using a petawatt laser to generate a relativistic electron beam for Fast Igniting inertial confinement fusion (ICF) target. One promising alternate approach is the laser generation of a proton beam. However, the total proton flux simply from water adsorption on the foil is too less to generate desired hot-spots. Here we propose to utilize a new “Deuterium Cluster “type structure for the laser interaction foil to generate an energetic deuteron beam as the fast igniter. The ultra high density deuterium in the cluster structure will promise much higher total flux for deuteron than for proton. Also, deuterons will serve very important dual purposes – the deuteron deposition in the target fuel will not only provide heating but also fuse with fuel as they slow down in the target. If the physics works as anticipated, the massive yield of deuterons generated from our cluster material through laser acceleration, should turn out to be the most efficient way of igniting the DT fuel, and making the dream of near-term commercialization of FI fusion more achievable.
Journal: TechConnect Briefs
Volume: Technical Proceedings of the 2010 Clean Technology Conference and Trade Show
Published: June 21, 2010
Pages: 21 - 24
Industry sector: Energy & Sustainability
Topic: Materials for Oil & Gas
ISBN: 978-1-4398-3419-0