Mechanism of growth reduction of the deceleration-phase ablative Rayleigh-Taylor instability

The deceleration-phase (dp) ablative Rayleigh-Taylor instability (RTI) of igniting and nonigniting inertial fusion capsules is studied by high-resolution two-dimensional Lagrangian fluid simulations. It is found that growth reduction of the dp-RTI with respect to classical RTI results from the advection of perturbed fluid elements outside a thin unstable fluid layer. Within this layer, at fixed Lagrangian position, perturbations grow approximately classically.