Speaker
Description
In a recent benchmarking experiment, a tritium beam was generated via the target normal sheath acceleration (TNSA) mechanism using tritiated titanium targets. These targets were irradiated with an on-target intensity of 2x10$^{18}$ W/cm$^2$ with the high-energy (1250-kJ), short-pulse (10-ps) OMEGA EP laser. The energy spectrum of the beam was found to exponentially decrease with a high-energy cutoff at ~10 MeV, containing ~10$^{12}$ tritons per pulse, comparable to other TNSA experiments with protons. In a second experiment, the tritium beam was directed onto a secondary deuterated-polyethylene target, which produced 10$^8$ neutrons from DT fusion nuclear reactions. However, studying reactions with lower cross-sections requires a substantial yield increase to obtain meaningful neutron spectra. While independent radiological measurements of the targets confirm that enough tritium is available for acceleration, proton contaminants lower the tritium acceleration efficiency. Therefore, a new experimental series has been scheduled on OMEGA-EP to investigate if the targets can be cleaned using a suitable laser pre-pulse. Preliminary experimental data and future applications of the tritium beam will be discussed.
This work was supported by the Department of Energy National Nuclear Security Administration under Award Number DE-NA0003856.
