Development of the laser evaporation ion source for lithium beam generation on the Particle Beam Fusion Accelerator (PBFA-II)

The Laser Evaporation Ion Source (LEVIS) active lithium ion source has been developed for use on the focusing ion diode operated on the 10 TW Particle Beam Fusion Accelerator-II (PBFA-II) [J. P. VanDevender and D. L. Cook, Science 232, 831 (1986)] at Sandia National Laboratories. The source configuration consists of two laser pulses impinging on a heated (200 degree C) thin-film LiAg layer on the anode surface. A short-pulse Nd:YAG laser creates a high-density vapor, which is then ionized by a long-pulse dye laser using the LIBORS (laser ionization based on resonant saturation) ionization method. Small-scale experiments determined that this dual laser-based approach can produce a source plasma of adequate density and confinement for acceleration and transport. Hardware modifications were undertaken to correct problems of premature impedance collapse and lack of beam lithium seen on previous PBFA-II experiments. As much as 85 kJ of Li is measured at the beam focus, but the source may not have been operating in a fully active (i.e., preformed) manner. Focusing performance appears superior to a passive LiF ion source operated on PBFA-II with the same magnetic field topology. copyright 1999 American Institute of Physics