Related Experiment Video
Updated: Oct 29, 2025

Optimization, Test and Diagnostics of Miniaturized Hall Thrusters
Published on: February 16, 2019
Three-dimensional diagnostics and measurements of inertial confinement fusion plasmas
D J Schlossberg1, R M Bionta1, D T Casey1
1Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, Livermore, California 94550, USA.
Abstract:
Recent inertial confinement fusion measurements have highlighted the importance of 3D asymmetry effects on implosion performance. One prominent example is the bulk drift velocity of the deuterium-tritium plasma undergoing fusion ("hotspot"), vHS. Upgrades to the National Ignition Facility neutron time-of-flight diagnostics now provide vHS to better than 1 part in 104 and enable cross correlations with other measurements. This work presents the impact of vHS on the neutron yield, downscatter ratio, apparent ion temperature, electron temperature, and 2D x-ray emission. The necessary improvements to diagnostic suites to take these measurements are also detailed. The benefits of using cross-diagnostic analysis to test hotspot models and theory are discussed, and cross-shot trends are shown.
Related Concept Videos
Inductively Coupled Plasma–Mass Spectrometry (ICP–MS): Overview
Inductively Coupled Plasma Atomic Emission Spectroscopy: Principle
The ions and electrons produced interact with the fluctuating magnetic field created by a water-cooled...
Inductively Coupled Plasma Atomic Emission Spectroscopy: Instrumentation
There are three main types of inductively coupled plasma atomic emission spectroscopy (ICP-AES) instruments: sequential, simultaneous multichannel, and Fourier transform instruments, with the latter being less commonly used....

