Direct-Drive Inertial Confinement Fusion Research at the Laboratory for Laser Energetics

Direct-drive inertial confinement fusion (ICF) offers the possibility of significantly higher gains than indirect-drive ICF for the same laser energy. The primary mission of the Laboratory for Laser Energetics (LLE) is to validate the direct-drive approach to ICF in anticipation of adding direct-drive capability on the National Ignition Facility (NIF) and the subsequent achievement of direct-drive ignition. LLE's research includes target design for direct-drive ignition experiments on the NIF, performance of cryogenic and noncryogenic target experiments on the 60-beam, 30-kJ OMEGA laser, diagnostic and target development for OMEGA and the NIF, and studies of key aspects of direct-drive ICF physics, including Rayleigh-Taylor instability, laser imprinting, and laser-plasma interactions. This paper reviews the progress made on the direct-drive physics program at LLE including a discussion of the "all-DT" target design for NIF direct-drive ignition, results from surrogate cryogenic "warm" targt experiments on OMEGA, and the first cryogenic capsule implosion experiments on the 60-bea OMEGA.