title: Optical Thomson scattering measurements of plasma parameters in the ablation stage of wire array Z pinches.
abstract: A Thomson scattering diagnostic has been used to measure the parameters of cylindrical wire array Z pinch plasmas during the ablation phase. The scattering operates in the collective regime (α>1) allowing spatially localized measurements of the ion or electron plasma temperatures and of the plasma bulk velocity. The ablation flow is found to accelerate towards the axis reaching peak velocities of 1.2-1.3×10(7) cm/s in aluminium and ∼1×10(7) cm/s in tungsten arrays. Precursor ion temperature measurements made shortly after formation are found to correspond to the kinetic energy of the converging ablation flow.
authors.affiliation: Blackett Laboratory, Imperial College, London, SW7 2BW, United Kingdom.
authors.forename: A J
authors.initials: AJ
authors.lastname: Harvey-Thompson
authors.forename: S V
authors.initials: SV
authors.lastname: Lebedev
authors.forename: S
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Patankar
authors.forename: S N
authors.initials: SN
authors.lastname: Bland
authors.forename: G
authors.initials: G
authors.lastname: Burdiak
authors.forename: J P
authors.initials: JP
authors.lastname: Chittenden
authors.forename: A
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Colaitis
authors.forename: P
authors.initials: P
authors.lastname: De Grouchy
authors.forename: H W
authors.initials: HW
authors.lastname: Doyle
authors.forename: G N
authors.initials: GN
authors.lastname: Hall
authors.forename: E
authors.initials: E
authors.lastname: Khoory
authors.forename: M
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Hohenberger
authors.forename: L
authors.initials: L
authors.lastname: Pickworth
authors.forename: F
authors.initials: F
authors.lastname: Suzuki-Vidal
authors.forename: R A
authors.initials: RA
authors.lastname: Smith
authors.forename: J
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Skidmore
authors.forename: L
authors.initials: L
authors.lastname: Suttle
authors.forename: G F
authors.initials: GF
authors.lastname: Swadling