title: Multicolor, time-gated, soft x-ray pinhole imaging of wire array and gas puff Z pinches on the Z and Saturn pulsed power generators.
abstract: A multicolor, time-gated, soft x-ray pinhole imaging instrument is fielded as part of the core diagnostic set on the 25 MA Z machine [M. E. Savage et al., in Proceedings of the Pulsed Power Plasma Sciences Conference (IEEE, New York, 2007), p. 979] for studying intense wire array and gas puff Z-pinch soft x-ray sources. Pinhole images are reflected from a planar multilayer mirror, passing 277 eV photons with <10 eV bandwidth. An adjacent pinhole camera uses filtration alone to view 1-10 keV photons simultaneously. Overlaying these data provides composite images that contain both spectral as well as spatial information, allowing for the study of radiation production in dense Z-pinch plasmas. Cu wire arrays at 20 MA on Z show the implosion of a colder cloud of material onto a hot dense core where K-shell photons are excited. A 528 eV imaging configuration has been developed on the 8 MA Saturn generator [R. B. Spielman et al., and A. I. P. Conf, Proc. 195, 3 (1989)] for imaging a bright Li-like Ar L-shell line. Ar gas puff Z pinches show an intense K-shell emission from a zippering stagnation front with L-shell emission dominating as the plasma cools.
authors.affiliation: Sandia National Laboratories, Albuquerque, New Mexico 8718, USA. bmjones@sandia.gov
authors.forename: B
authors.initials: B
authors.lastname: Jones
authors.forename: C A
authors.initials: CA
authors.lastname: Coverdale
authors.forename: D S
authors.initials: DS
authors.lastname: Nielsen
authors.forename: M C
authors.initials: MC
authors.lastname: Jones
authors.forename: C
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Deeney
authors.forename: J D
authors.initials: JD
authors.lastname: Serrano
authors.forename: L B
authors.initials: LB
authors.lastname: Nielsen-Weber
authors.forename: C J
authors.initials: CJ
authors.lastname: Meyer
authors.forename: J P
authors.initials: JP
authors.lastname: Apruzese
authors.forename: R W
authors.initials: RW
authors.lastname: Clark
authors.forename: P L
authors.initials: PL
authors.lastname: Coleman