Expand this Topic clickable element to expand a topic
Skip to content
Optica Publishing Group

National Ignition Facility laser performance status

Not Accessible

Your library or personal account may give you access

Abstract

The National Ignition Facility (NIF) is the world's largest laser system. It contains a 192 beam neodymium glass laser that is designed to deliver 1.8  MJ at 500  TW at 351  nm in order to achieve energy gain (ignition) in a deuterium–tritium nuclear fusion target. To meet this goal, laser design criteria include the ability to generate pulses of up to 1.8  MJ total energy, with peak power of 500 TW and temporal pulse shapes spanning 2 orders of magnitude at the third harmonic (351  nm or 3ω) of the laser wavelength. The focal-spot fluence distribution of these pulses is carefully controlled, through a combination of special optics in the 1ω(1053  nm) portion of the laser (continuous phase plates), smoothing by spectral dispersion, and the overlapping of multiple beams with orthogonal polarization (polarization smoothing). We report performance qualification tests of the first eight beams of the NIF laser. Measurements are reported at both 1ω and 3ω, both with and without focal-spot conditioning. When scaled to full 192 beam operation, these results demonstrate, to the best of our knowledge for the first time, that the NIF will meet its laser performance design criteria, and that the NIF can simultaneously meet the temporal pulse shaping, focal-spot conditioning, and peak power requirements for two candidate indirect drive ignition designs.

© 2007 Optical Society of America

Full Article  |  PDF Article
More Like This
Comment on "National Ignition Facility laser performance status"

Stephen E. Bodner
Appl. Opt. 47(10) 1387-1388 (2008)

Response to comment on “The National Ignition Facility laser performance status”

C. A. Haynam, R. A. Sacks, E. I. Moses, K. Manes, S. Haan, and M. L. Spaeth
Appl. Opt. 47(10) 1384-1386 (2008)

National Ignition Facility system alignment

S. C. Burkhart, E. Bliss, P. Di Nicola, D. Kalantar, R. Lowe-Webb, T. McCarville, D. Nelson, T. Salmon, T. Schindler, J. Villanueva, and K. Wilhelmsen
Appl. Opt. 50(8) 1136-1157 (2011)

Cited By

You do not have subscription access to this journal. Cited by links are available to subscribers only. You may subscribe either as an Optica member, or as an authorized user of your institution.

Contact your librarian or system administrator
or
Login to access Optica Member Subscription

Figures (43)

You do not have subscription access to this journal. Figure files are available to subscribers only. You may subscribe either as an Optica member, or as an authorized user of your institution.

Contact your librarian or system administrator
or
Login to access Optica Member Subscription

Tables (5)

You do not have subscription access to this journal. Article tables are available to subscribers only. You may subscribe either as an Optica member, or as an authorized user of your institution.

Contact your librarian or system administrator
or
Login to access Optica Member Subscription

Equations (4)

You do not have subscription access to this journal. Equations are available to subscribers only. You may subscribe either as an Optica member, or as an authorized user of your institution.

Contact your librarian or system administrator
or
Login to access Optica Member Subscription

Select as filters


Select Topics Cancel
© Copyright 2024 | Optica Publishing Group. All Rights Reserved