Time Integrated Soft X-ray Imaging in High Intensity Laser Experiments (thesis)

2009 marks a significant achievement and the dawn of a new era in high intensity laser research with the final commissioning of all 192 beams at the National Ignition Facility (NIF). NIF is a department of energy (DOE) funded project more than 10 years in the making located at the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL). The following research was done as one of many preliminary experiments done to prepare for these historic events. The primary focus of the experimental campaign this paper addresses is to test and develop a thermal x-radiation source using a short pulse laser. This data is hoped to provide information about the thermal transport mechanisms important in the development of prediction models in High Energy Density (HED) science. One of several diagnostics fielded was a soft x-ray imager (SXRI) which is detailed in this paper. The SXRI will be used to measure the relative size of the heated region and also the relative level of specific x-ray emissions among several shot and target configurations. The laser system used was the Titan laser located in the Jupiter Laser Facility (JLF) at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL). Titan uses the JLF Janus Nd:glass laser west frontend system with a Optical Parametric Chirped Pulse Amplification (OPCPA) in place of the nanosecond oscillator. The system is capable of producing laser intensities of over a petawatt with several tens of joules delivered in the beam