Advanced conceptual design report for the Z-Beamlet laser backlighter

The Z-accelerator facility at Sandia National Laboratories (SNL) in Albuquerque, New Mexico, performs critical experiments on the physics of matter at extremely high energy density as part of the Department of Energy's nuclear weapons Stockpile Stewardship Program. In order to augment and enhance the value of experiments performed at this facility, the construction of a new x-ray backlighting diagnostic system is required. New information would be obtained by recording images and/or spectra of x-ray radiation transmitted through target materials as they evolve during Z-accelerator-driven experiments (or ''shots''). In this application, we generally think of the diagnostic x-rays as illumination produced behind the target materials and detected after passing through the Z-target. Hence the x-ray source is commonly called a ''backlighter.'' The methodology is a specific implementation of the general science known as x-ray radiography and/or x-ray spectroscopy. X-ray backlighter experiments have been performed in inertial confinement fusion (ICF) facilities in many countries. On Nova, experience with backlighters has been obtained since about 1986. An intense source of x-rays is produced by focusing one of its beams on a backlighter target nearby, while the other beams are used to create the high-energy-density conditions to be studied in the experiment. This conceptual design report describes how a laser-backlighter similar to one beam of Nova could be constructed for use at Sandia's Z-accelerator facility. The development of such a facility at Sandia is timely for two major reasons. First, at LLNL the Beamlet laser was decommissioned in FY98, and the Nova laser will be decommissioned in FY99, in preparation for activation of the National Ignition Facility (NIF). This will provide several million dollars worth of subsystems and components from which to construct other lasers, such as the Z-backlighter. Second, the new diagnostic capability at Sandia will provide a national resource for experimentation that would otherwise not exist to complement Nova, and future NIF experiments. In this report, the primary criteria and functional requirements for an x-ray backlighter diagnostic at the Z-accelerator facility are discussed at the beginning of Chapter 2 (Section 2.1). This is followed by a detailed discussion of subsystem design requirements (SSDRs) for a laser-backlighter that can meet these requirements (Section 2.2). Chapter 3 describes a conceptual design for a laser system that meets these requirements. Chapter 4 provides schedule information for the proposed project. A summary of overall project costs (in FY99 dollars) is shown in Table 1-1