Laser-driven inertial ion focusing.
A Hohlraum-like configuration is proposed for realizing a simple compact source for neutrons. A laser pulse enters a tiny thin-shelled hollow-sphere target through a small opening and is self-consistently trapped in the cavity. The electrons in the inner shell-wall region are expelled by the light pressure. The resulting space-charge field compresses the local ions into a thin layer that becomes strongly heated. An inward expansion of ions into the shell cavity then occurs, resulting in the formation at the cavity center of a hot spot of ions at high density and temperature, similar to that in inertial electrostatic confinement.
Zhuo
H B
HB
National Laboratory for Parallel and Distributed Processing, School of Computer Science, National University of Defense Technology, Changsha 410073, China. zhb_pic_2d@sina.com
Yu
Wei
W
Yu
M Y
MY
Xu
H
H
Wang
X
X
Shen
B F
BF
Sheng
Z M
ZM
Zhang
J
J