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We have conceived a new class of prime-power sources for pulsed-power accelerators: impedance-matched Marx generators (IMGs). The fundamental building block of an IMG is a brick, which consists of two capacitors connected electrically in series with a single switch. An IMG comprises a single stage or several stages distributed axially and connected in series. Each stage is powered by a single brick or several bricks distributed azimuthally within the stage and connected in parallel. The stages of a multistage IMG drive an impedance-matched coaxial transmission line with a conical center conductor. When the stages are triggered sequentially to launch a coherent traveling wave along the coaxial line, the IMG achieves electromagnetic-power amplification by triggered emission of radiation. Hence a multistage IMG is a pulsed-power analogue of a laser. To illustrate the IMG approach to prime power, we have developed conceptual designs of two ten-stage IMGs with LC time constants on the order of 100 ns. One design includes 20 bricks per stage, and delivers a peak electrical power of 1.05 TW to a matched-impedance 1.22-Ω load. The design generates 113 kV per stage and has a maximum energy efficiency of 89%. The other design includes a single brick per stage, delivers 68 GW to a matched-impedance 19-Ω load, generates 113 kV per stage, and has a maximum energy efficiency of 90%. For a given electrical-power-output time history, an IMG is less expensive and slightly more efficient than a linear transformer driver, since an IMG does not use ferromagnetic cores.

We have developed a conceptual design of a next-generation pulsed-power accelerator that is optimized for megajoule-class dynamic-material-physics experiments. Sufficient electrical energy is delivered by the accelerator to a physics load to achieve—within centimeter-scale samples—material pressures as high as 1 TPa. The accelerator design is based on an architecture that is founded on three concepts: single-stage electrical-pulse compression, impedance matching, and transit-time-isolated drive circuits. The prime power source of the accelerator consists of 600 independent impedance-matched Marx generators. Each Marx comprises eight 5.8-GW bricks connected electrically in series, and generates a 100-ns 46-GW electrical-power pulse. A 450-ns-long water-insulated coaxial-transmission-line impedance transformer transports the power generated by each Marx to a system of twelve 2.5-m-radius water-insulated conical transmission lines. The conical lines are connected electrically in parallel at a 66-cm radius by a water-insulated 45-post sextuple-post-hole convolute. The convolute sums the electrical currents at the outputs of the conical lines, and delivers the combined current to a single solid-dielectric-insulated radial transmission line. The radial line in turn transmits the combined current to the load. Since much of the accelerator is water insulated, we refer to it as Neptune. Neptune is 40 m in diameter, stores 4.8 MJ of electrical energy in its Marx capacitors, and generates 28 TW of peak electrical power. Since the Marxes are transit-time isolated from each other for 900 ns, they can be triggered at different times to construct–over an interval as long as 1 μs–the specific load-current time history required for a given experiment. Neptune delivers 1 MJ and 20 MA in a 380-ns current pulse to an 18-mΩ load; hence Neptune is a megajoule-class 20-MA arbitrary waveform generator. Neptune will allow the international scientific community to conduct dynamic equation-of-state, phase-transition, mechanical-property, and other material-physics experiments with a wide variety of drive-pressure time histories.

We have developed the design of Thor: a pulsed power accelerator that delivers a precisely shaped current pulse with a peak value as high as 7 MA to a strip-line load. The peak magnetic pressure achieved within a 1-cm-wide load is as high as 100 GPa. Thor is powered by as many as 288 decoupled and transit-time isolated bricks. Each brick consists of a single switch and two capacitors connected electrically in series. The bricks can be individually triggered to achieve a high degree of current pulse tailoring. Because the accelerator is impedance matched throughout, capacitor energy is delivered to the strip-line load with an efficiency as high as 50%. We used an iterative finite element method (FEM), circuit, and magnetohydrodynamic simulations to develop an optimized accelerator design. When powered by 96 bricks, Thor delivers as much as 4.1 MA to a load, and achieves peak magnetic pressures as high as 65 GPa. When powered by 288 bricks, Thor delivers as much as 6.9 MA to a load, and achieves magnetic pressures as high as 170 GPa. We have developed an algebraic calculational procedure that uses the single brick basis function to determine the brick-triggering sequence necessary to generate a highly tailored current pulse time history for shockless loading of samples. Thor will drive a wide variety of magnetically driven shockless ramp compression, shockless flyer plate, shock-ramp, equation of state, material strength, phase transition, and other advanced material physics experiments.