Developing solid-state experiments on the Nova laser

An X-ray drive has been developed to shock compress metal foils in the solid state using an internally shielded hohlraum with a high contrast shaped pulse from the Nova laser. The drive has been characterized, and hydrodynamics experiments designed to study the growth of the Rayleigh-Taylor (R-T) instability in Cu foils at 3 Mbar peak pressures in the plastic how regime have been started. Preimposed modulations with an initial wavelength of 20-50 mu m and amplitudes of 1.0-2.5 mu m show growth consistent with simulations. In the Nova experiments, the fluid and solid states are expected to behave similarly for Cu. An analytic stability analysis is used to motivate an experimental design with an Al foil where the effects of material strength of the R-T growth are significantly enhanced. The conditions reached in the metal foils at peak compression are similar to those predicted at the core of Earth.