Anomalous shock scaling in ICF implosions dominated by high-energy X-ray preheat

The design of inertial confinement fusion implosions relies on the predictable control of shock dynamics, where the first-shock strength is conventionally governed by the initial laser picket intensity. Here, using shock timing experiments at the SG 100 kJ laser facility, we report a distinct deviation from this conventional scaling: when a high-power main pulse precedes shock breakout, the first-shock velocity in liquid deuterium decreases with increasing picket drive. We attribute this anomaly to preheating of the ablator by high-energy X rays from the early main pulse. Integrated simulations and theory reveal that this preheating induces a rapid pressure rise at the ablator fuel interface. The resulting enhanced pressure overrides the picket driven dynamics during shock impedance matching, accelerating the shock into the fuel and thus inverting the expected scaling. Our findings establish a pressure-dominated mechanism that revises the framework for shock tuning in preheat-affected implosions and provides direct guidance for pulse shaping in future high-energy-drive designs.

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Publication Details

Journal
Matter and Radiation at Extremes
Published
2026-09-28
DOI
https://doi.org/10.1063/5.0332964
Primary Topic
Laser-Plasma Interactions and Diagnostics
Type
article
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article

Anomalous shock scaling in ICF implosions dominated by high-energy X-ray preheat

Jiamin Yang, Yuxue Zhang, Zhebin Wang, Zanyang Guan et al.
Matter and Radiation at Extremes
Laser-Plasma Interactions and Diagnostics
article

Anomalous shock scaling in ICF implosions dominated by high-energy X-ray preheat

Jiamin Yang, Yuxue Zhang, Zhebin Wang, Zanyang Guan, Yunsong Dong, Yudong Pu, Xiaoxi Duan, Dong Sheng Yang, L. F. Wang, Dongxiao Liu, Hao Liu, J. Yan, Fengjun Ge, Tianxuan Huang, Chen Zhang, Zhichao Li, Weiming Yang, Yongkun Ding, Yulong Li, Huan Zhang, Zongqing Zhao
article en

Abstract

The design of inertial confinement fusion implosions relies on the predictable control of shock dynamics, where the first-shock strength is conventionally governed by the initial laser picket intensity. Here, using shock timing experiments at the SG 100 kJ laser facility, we report a distinct deviation from this conventional scaling: when a high-power main pulse precedes shock breakout, the first-shock velocity in liquid deuterium decreases with increasing picket drive. We attribute this anomaly to preheating of the ablator by high-energy X rays from the early main pulse. Integrated simulations and theory reveal that this preheating induces a rapid pressure rise at the ablator fuel interface. The resulting enhanced pressure overrides the picket driven dynamics during shock impedance matching, accelerating the shock into the fuel and thus inverting the expected scaling. Our findings establish a pressure-dominated mechanism that revises the framework for shock tuning in preheat-affected implosions and provides direct guidance for pulse shaping in future high-energy-drive designs.

Matter and Radiation at ExtremesVol. 11(6)
China Academy of Engineering Physics (CN), Chinese Academy of Engineering (CN), Institute of Applied Physics and Computational Mathematics (CN)
Affordable and clean energy
Openalex Percentile: Top 13%
Laser-Plasma Interactions and Diagnostics
DOIOpen Access PDFOpenAlex
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