Abstract

Laser-driven inertial confinement fusion (ICF) experiments are being performed at several laboratories throughout the world. Nearly all are exploring the implosion process in an effort to demonstrate compressed fuel densities of several hundred g/cm³. For ICF to be an efficient process, it is desirable to compress the fuel along a near- Fermi degenerate adiabat. Addition of thermal energy prior to achieving the compressed state is detrimental in that a significantly larger driver would be required to achieve ignition.

© 1986 Optical Society of America