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The quantitative measurement of plasma soft x-ray spectra is an important diagnostic problem in indirect-drive laser inertial confinement fusion (ICF). We designed, built, and tested a compact multichannel soft x-ray spectrometer with both spatial and temporal resolution capabilities for the detection of the spatiotemporal distribution of soft x-ray spectra. The spectrometer occupies a small solid angle, and the close measurement angle used for each channel enables the measurement of the angular distribution of emitting soft x-rays in ICF experiments. The spectrometer comprises pinhole, filter, and multilayer flat mirror arrays, and an x-ray streak camera. Its energy range is 0.1 - 3 keV. The dispersive elements of the spectrometer were calibrated at the Beijing Synchrotron Radiation Facility. The accuracy of the calibration was ≤ 5%, and the combined energy resolution (E/ΔE) of the calibrated dispersive elements of each channel was higher than 10. Finally, the instrument was tested at the Shenguang-III Laser Facility. The measurement results of x-ray radiation flux are agreed well with the experimental results of the M-band flat-response x-ray diode, demonstrating the feasibility of the proposed spectrometer configuration.

A new method for measuring the time-dependent drive flux at the hohlraum center is proposed as a better alternative to conventional wall-based techniques. The drive flux here is obtained by simultaneous measurement of the reemitted flux and shock velocity from a three-layered "cakelike" sample. With these two independent observables, the influence induced by the uncertainty of the material parameters of the sample can be effectively decreased. The influence from the closure of the laser entrance hole, which was the main challenge in conventional wall-based techniques, was avoided through localized reemitted flux measurement, facilitating drive flux measurement throughout the entire time history. These studies pave a new way for probing the time-dependent drive flux, for both cylindrical hohlraums and novel hohlraums with six laser entrance holes.

In inertial confinement approaches to fusion, the asymmetry of target implosion is a major obstacle to achieving high gain in the laboratory. A recently proposed octahedral spherical hohlraum makes it possible to naturally create spherical target irradiation without supplementary symmetry control. Before any decision is made to pursue an ignition-scale laser system based on the octahedral hohlraum, one needs to test the concept with the existing facilities. Here, we report a proof-of-concept experiment for the novel octahedral hohlraum geometry on the cylindrically configured SGIII laser facility without a symmetry control. All polar and equatorial self-emission images of the compressed target show a near round shape of convergence ratio 15 under both square and shaped laser pulses. The observed implosion performances agree well with the ideal spherical implosion simulation. It also shows limitations with using the existing facilities and adds further weight to the need to move to a spherical port geometry for future ignition laser facilities.

This study explores the radiation field temperatures introduced by the laser spot, the re-emitting wall in a hohlraum and the entire hohlraum drive source. This investigation, which is the first of its kind, is based on the radiation fluxes from the laser spot and the re-emitting wall, which have been accurately measured using time- and space-resolving flux detectors in a recent work, and additional flux data. The temperature difference between the laser spot and the entire hohlraum drive source was 6.08-35.35% of the temperature of the latter throughout the entire laser pulse, whilst that for the re-emitting wall was 3.90-12.81%. The radiation temperature of the cooler re-emitting wall had more influence on the temperature increase of the entire hohlraum drive source than the hot laser-spot temperature, which has been quantitatively discussed. Experimentally, we established the average distributions of the temperature fields of all the emitting sources, namely laser spot and re-emitting wall, of the irradiating fluxes on the capsule region in the hohlraum radiation field. This important progress in the exploration of radiation temperature distributions within a hohlraum will provide a foundation for determination of the irradiating radiation on the capsule and evaluation of capsule symmetry.

Space-resolving flux detection is an important technique for the diagnostic of the radiation field within the hohlraum in inertial confinement fusion, especially for the radiation field diagnostic in the novel spherical hohlraum with octahedral six laser entrance holes (LEHs), where localized measurements are necessary for the discrimination of the radiation flux from different LEHs. A novel space-resolving flux detector (SRFD) is developed at the SG-III laser facility for the radiation flux measurement in the first campaign of the octahedral spherical hohlraum energetics experiment. The principle and configuration of the SRFD system is introduced. The radiation flux from the wall of a gas-filled octahedral spherical hohlraum is measured for the first time by placing the SRFD system at the equatorial position of the SG-III laser facility, aiming at the hohlraum wall through one of the six LEHs. The absolute radiation flux from the re-emission area on the hohlraum wall is measured, and good consistency is found between the experimental data and the calculated data from a three-dimensional view factor analysis.

The first octahedral spherical hohlraum energetics experiment is accomplished at the SGIII laser facility. For the first time, the 32 laser beams are injected into the octahedral spherical hohlraum through six laser entrance holes. Two techniques are used to diagnose the radiation field of the octahedral spherical hohlraum in order to obtain comprehensive experimental data. The radiation flux streaming out of laser entrance holes is measured by six flat-response x-ray detectors (FXRDs) and four M-band x-ray detectors, which are placed at different locations of the SGIII target chamber. The radiation temperature is derived from the measured flux of FXRD by using the blackbody assumption. The peak radiation temperature inside hohlraum is determined by the shock wave technique. The experimental results show that the octahedral spherical hohlraum radiation temperature is in the range of 170-182 eV with drive laser energies of 71 kJ to 84 kJ. The radiation temperature inside the hohlraum determined by the shock wave technique is about 175 eV at 71 kJ. For the flat-top laser pulse of 3 ns, the conversion efficiency of gas-filled octahedral spherical hohlraum from laser into soft x rays is about 80% according to the two-dimensional numerical simulation.

The accuracy of the determination of the burn-averaged ion temperature of inertial confinement fusion implosions depends on the unfold process, including deconvolution and convolution methods, and the function, i.e., the detector response, used to fit the signals measured by neutron time-of-flight (nToF) detectors. The function given by Murphy et al. [Rev. Sci. Instrum. 68(1), 610-613 (1997)] has been widely used in Nova, Omega, and NIF. There are two components, i.e., fast and slow, and the contribution of scattered neutrons has not been dedicatedly considered. In this work, a new function, based on Murphy's function has been employed to unfold nToF signals. The contribution of scattered neutrons is easily included by the convolution of a Gaussian response function and an exponential decay. The ion temperature is measured by nToF with the new function. Good agreement with the ion temperature determined by the deconvolution method has been achieved.

In laser driven hohlraums, laser beams on the same incident cone may have different beam and plasma conditions, causing beam-to-beam backscatter difference and subsequent azimuthal variations in the x-ray drive on the capsule. To elucidate the large variation of backscatter proportion from beam to beam in some gas-filled hohlraum shots on Shenguang-III, two 28.5° beams have been measured with the Stimulated Raman Scattering (SRS) time-resolved spectra. A bifurcated fiber is used to sample two beams and then coupled to a spectrometer and streak camera combination to reduce the cost. The SRS spectra, characterized by a broad wavelength, were further corrected considering the temporal distortion and intensity modulation caused by components along the light path. This measurement will improve the understanding of the beam propagation inside the hohlraum and related laser plasma instabilities.

Octahedral spherical hohlraums with a single laser ring at an injection angle of 55^{∘} are attractive concepts for laser indirect drive due to the potential for achieving the x-ray drive symmetry required for high convergence implosions. Laser-plasma instabilities, however, are a concern given the long laser propagation path in such hohlraums. Significant stimulated Raman scattering has been observed in cylindrical hohlraums with similar laser propagation paths during the ignition campaign on the National Ignition Facility (NIF). In this Rapid Communication, experiments demonstrating low levels of laser-driven plasma instability (LPI) in spherical hohlraums with a laser injection angle of 55^{∘} are reported and compared to that observed with cylindrical hohlraums with injection angles of 28.5^{∘} and 55^{∘}, similar to that of the NIF. Significant LPI is observed with the laser injection of 28.5^{∘} in the cylindrical hohlraum where the propagation path is similar to the 55^{∘} injection angle for the spherical hohlraum. The experiments are performed on the SGIII laser facility with a total 0.35-μm incident energy of 93 kJ in a 3 nsec pulse. These experiments demonstrate the role of hohlraum geometry in LPI and demonstrate the need for systematic experiments for choosing the optimal configuration for ignition studies with indirect drive inertial confinement fusion.

Neutron emission measurement at the HL-2A tokamak device with a liquid scintillation detector is described. The detector was placed at a location with little structure material in the field of view, and equipped with a gain monitoring system which could provide the possibility to evaluate the gain variation as well as to correct for the detector response. Time trace of the neutron emissivity was obtained and it was consistent with the result of a standard (235)U fission chamber. During the plasma discharge the neutron yield could vary by about four orders of magnitude and the fluctuation of the detector gain was up to about 6%. Pulse height spectrum of the liquid scintillation detector was constructed and corrected with the aid of the gain monitoring system, and the correction was found to be essential for the assessment of the neutron energy spectrum. This successful measurement offered experience and confidence for the application of liquid scintillation detectors in the upcoming neutron camera system.

A new compact stilbene crystal neutron spectrometer has been investigated and applied in the neutron emission spectroscopy on the EAST tokamak. A new components analysis method is presented to study the anisotropic light output in the stilbene crystal detector. A Geant4 code was developed to simulate the neutron responses in the spectrometer. Based on both the optimal light output function and the fitted pulse height resolution function, a reliable neutron response matrix was obtained by Geant4 simulations and validated by 2.5 MeV and 14 MeV neutron measurements at a 4.5 MV Van de Graaff accelerator. The spectrometer was used to diagnose the ion temperature in plasma discharges with lower hybrid wave injection and ion cyclotron resonance heating on the EAST tokamak.

Digital discrimination of neutron and gamma-ray events in an organic scintillator has been investigated by moment analysis. Signals induced by an americium-beryllium (Am/Be) isotropic neutron source in a stilbene crystal detector have been sampled with a flash analogue-to-digital converter (ADC) of 1 GSamples/s sampling rate and 10-bit vertical resolution. Neutrons and gamma-rays have been successfully discriminated with a threshold corresponding to gamma-ray energy about 217 keV. Moment analysis has also been verified against the results assessed by a time-of-flight (TOF) measurement. It is shown that the classification of neutrons and gamma-rays afforded by moment analysis is consistent with that achieved by digital TOF measurement. This method has been applied to analyze the data acquired from the stilbene crystal detector in mixed radiation field of the HL-2A tokamak deuterium plasma discharges and the results are described.