Measurements of axial nonuniformities in gas-puff implosions

Large-scale-length axial nonuniformities in imploding z pinches have been measured with a time-resolved framing pinhole camera and a filtered x-ray diode. The nonuniform initial conditions of the annular gas column result in a nonsimultaneous stagnation along the pinch axis. By tailoring the initial gas-puff density distribution we have reduced the time interval of stagnation from 10 ns to below 4 ns for a 2-cm-long pinch