Synthetic diagnostics for laser-driven fusion experiments

Experiments in the US and EU are currently trying to assess the feasibility of firing lasers directly at a deuterium-tritium fuel pellet to drive implosion and ultimately initiate fusion. This is all with a long-term goal of developing a laser driven fusion power source. One possible route forward is so called shock ignition. Here the laser power is kept low while the pellet is being compressed, to avoid deleterious plasma instabilities, and then the power is ramped up at the end to drive a final igniting shock. Warwick has a suite of simulation codes for modelling such experiments but these codes have either transport coefficients which are only approximately known or fast kinetic processes which are not directly observable. This project will develop synthetic diagnostics so that the simulations produce output which can be directly compared to the results of experiments. Going further the aim is to use the datasets from experiments in the US and France to see how well these help to constrain the unknowns in the simulations. The more tightly coupled simulation and experimental datasets will help understand more clearly what is happening in experiments and improve our modelling capability for future laser-fusion programmes.

Research at Warwick University’s Centre for Fusion, Space and Astrophysics (CFSA) focuses on plasma physics applied to the grand challenges of fusion energy, space physics, solar physics, and astrophysics. Our work spans fundamental theory, observation, and the analysis of experimental data, combined with high performance computing. For more details of the CFSA see http://go.warwick.ac.uk/cfsa

The project is available for 3.5 years with a start date of 2 October 2017.

If interested in the first instance contact Professor Tony Arber, Physics Department, University of Warwick ([Email Address Removed])