Review of heavy-ion inertial fusion physics

In this review paper on heavy ion inertial fusion(HIF),the state-of-the-art scientific results are presented and discussed on the HIF physics,including physics of the heavy ion beam(HIB)transport in a fusion reactor,the HIBs-ion illumination on a direct-drive fuel target,the fuel target physics,the uniformity of the HIF target implosion,the smoothing mechanisms of the target implosion non-uniformity and the robust target implosion.The HIB has remarkable preferable features to release the fusion energy in inertial fusion:in particle accelerators HIBs are generated with a high driver efficiency of~30%-40%,and the HIB ions deposit their energy inside of materials.Therefore,a requirement for the fusion target energy gain is relatively low,that would be~50-70 to operate a HIF fusion reactor with the standard energy output of 1 GWof electricity.The HIF reactor operation frequency would be~10-15 Hz or so.Several-MJ HIBs illuminate a fusion fuel target,and the fuel target is imploded to about a thousand times of the solid density.Then the DT fuel is ignited and burned.The HIB ion deposition range is defined by the HIB ions stopping length,which would be~1 mm or so depending on the material.Therefore,a relatively large density-scale length appears in the fuel target material.One of the critical issues in inertial fusion would be a spherically uniform target compression,which would be degraded by a non-uniform implosion.The implosion non-uniformity would be introduced by the Rayleigh-Taylor(R-T)instability,and the large densitygradient-scale length helps to reduce the R-T growth rate.On the other hand,the large scale length of the HIB ions stopping range suggests that the temperature at the energy deposition layer in a HIF target does not reach a very-high temperature:normally about 300 eV or so is realized in the energy absorption region,and that a direct-drive target would be appropriate in HIF.In addition,the HIB accelerators are operated repetitively and stably.The precise control of the HIB axis manipulation is also realized in the HIF accelerator,and the HIB wobbling motion may give another tool to smooth the HIB illumination non-uniformity.The key issues in HIF physics are also discussed and presented in the paper.

Mitigating parametric instabilities in plasmas by sunlight-like lasers

Sunlight-like lasers that have a continuous broad frequency spectrum,random phase spectrum,and random polarization are formulated theoretically.With a sunlight-like laser beam consisting of a sequence of temporal speckles,the resonant three-wave coupling that underlies parametric instabilities in laser–plasma interactions can be greatly degraded owing to the limited duration of each speckle and the frequency shift between two adjacent speckles.The wave coupling can be further weakened by the random polarization of such beams.Numerical simulations demonstrate that the intensity threshold of stimulated Raman scattering in homogeneous plasmas can be doubled by using a sunlight-like laser beam with a relative bandwidth of∼1%as compared with a monochromatic laser beam.Consequently,the hot-electron generation harmful to inertial confinement fusion can be effectively controlled by using sunlight-like laser drivers.Such drivers may be realized in the next generation of broadband lasers by combining two or more broadband beams with independent phase spectra or by applying polarization smoothing to a single broadband beam.

Quasi-monoenergetic Tens-of-MeV Proton Beams by a Laser-Illuminated Funnel-Like Target

From numerical simulations,we study the generation of quasi-monoenergetic MeV proton beams from a laserilluminated funnel-like target.We show that,when passing through such a target,the laser beam can be focused and constricted within a cylindrical bore at the funnel apex from which proton beams are produced.Accompanied by a much-enhanced laser intensity,the proton beams experience more acceleration time than with normal funnel targets.Constriction from the cylinder bore,combined with an enhancement of a separated charge field from Al electrons,protons can attain higher energies up to several tens of MeV.At the same time,strong suppression of the transverse divergence of the laser and proton beams yields a localized,collimated,mono-energetic proton beam.

Dynamic stabilization of plasma instability

The paper presents a review of dynamic stabilization mechanisms for plasma instabilities. One of the dynamic stabilization mechanisms for plasma instability was proposed in the paper [Kawata, Phys. Plasmas 19, 024503(2012)],based on a perturbation phase control. In general, instabilities emerge from the perturbations. Normally the perturbation phase is unknown, and so the instability growth rate is discussed. However, if the perturbation phase is known, the instability growth can be controlled by a superimposition of perturbations imposed actively. Based on this mechanism we present the application results of the dynamic stabilization mechanism to the Rayleigh–Taylor instability(RTI) and to the filamentation instability as typical examples in this paper. On the other hand, in the paper [Boris, Comments Plasma Phys. Control. Fusion 3, 1(1977)] another mechanism was proposed to stabilize RTI, and was realized by the pulse train or the laser intensity modulation in laser inertial fusion [Betti et al., Phys. Rev. Lett. 71, 3131(1993)]. In this latter mechanism, an oscillating strong force is applied to modify the basic equation, and consequently the new stabilization window is created. Originally the latter was proposed by Kapitza. We review the two stabilization mechanisms, and present the application results of the former dynamic stabilization mechanism.