Design of a 250 eV cryogenic ignition capsule for the National Ignition Facility

Optimized performance of a capsule intended to produce ignition on the National Ignition Facility [ J. A. Paisner, J. D. Boyes, S. A. Kumpan, W. H. Lowdermilk, and M. S. Sorem, Laser Focus World 30, 75 (1994) ] is presented. Performance is optimized, for a 250 eV isotropic drive on a beryllium(copper) ablator, by varying the ablator outside radius, ablator thickness, the concentration of copper dopant in the ablator, and the fuel thickness, while keeping the absorbed energy fixed. Dopant concentration is constrained to be uniform in the ablator. The drive shock timing is adjusted to produce a low entropy implosion for each set of dimensions. The absorbed energy is kept fixed at 190 kJ, which results in the ablator outside radius remaining practically constant, about 0.137 cm. For capsule geometry near that resulting in optimal implosion yield, the absorbed energy depends only slightly on the ablator or fuel thickness. The parameter space of capsule dimensions was searched for central vapor densities of 0.3 and 0.5 mg/cc. Despite the detailed optimization, it is found that the capsule is notably more unstable than comparable capsules with a graded dopant in the ablator, as reported in previous literature. (C) 2004 American Institute of Physics.