Magnetized Liner Inertial Fusion (MagLIF) at Sandia National Laboratories involves a laser preheating stage where a few-ns laser pulse passes through a few-micron-thick plastic window to preheat gaseous fusion fuel contained within the MagLIF target. Interactions with this window reduce heating efficiency and mix window and target materials into the fuel. A recently proposed idea called "Laser Gate" involves removing the window well before the preheating laser is applied. In this article, we present experimental proof-of-principle results for a pulsed-power implementation of Laser Gate, where a thin current-carrying wire weakens the perimeter of the window, allowing the fuel pressure to push the window open and away from the preheating laser path. For this effort, transparent targets were fabricated and a test facility capable of studying this version of Laser Gate was developed. A 12-frame bright-field laser schlieren/shadowgraphy imaging system captured the window opening dynamics on microsecond timescales. The images reveal that the window remains largely intact as it opens and detaches from the target. A column of escaping pressurized gas appears to prevent the detached window from inadvertently moving into the preheating laser path.

中文翻译：

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“激光门”的脉冲功率实现，用于增加磁化线性惯性聚变 (MagLIF) 中的激光能量耦合和聚变产率

桑迪亚国家实验室的磁化线性惯性聚变 (MagLIF) 涉及激光预热阶段，其中几纳秒的激光脉冲穿过几微米厚的塑料窗口，以预热 MagLIF 目标中包含的气态聚变燃料。与该窗口的相互作用会降低加热效率并将窗口和目标材料混合到燃料中。最近提出的一个名为“激光门”的想法涉及在应用预热激光之前移除窗口。在本文中，我们展示了激光门脉冲功率实现的原理验证结果，其中一根细的载流线削弱了窗户的周边，允许燃料压力推动窗户打开并远离预热激光路径。为了这一努力，制造了透明目标，并开发了能够研究此版本激光门的测试设备。一个 12 帧明场激光纹影/阴影成像系统在微秒时间尺度上捕获了窗户打开动态。图像显示窗口在打开和与目标分离时基本保持完整。一列逃逸的加压气体出现，以防止分离的窗口无意中进入预热激光路径。