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P. Keiter, R. P. Drake (U. Michigan9), T. S. Perry, H. Robey, B. A. Remington (LLNL), N. Turner, J. Stone (U. Maryland), J. Knauer (Lab. for Laser Energetics, U. Rochester)
Many astrophysical systems, such as supernova remnants and jets, produce radiative-precursor shock waves. In a radiative-precursor shock, radiation from the shock ionizes and heats the medium ahead of it. The simulation of such systems requires that one treat both the emission and the absorption of the radiation. This motivates our experimental design, both as a direct demonstration of the phenomenon and as a test case for astrophysical simulation codes. An important goal of this effort is to produce an experiment that can be modeled without implementing laser absorption physics into an astrophysical code.
The experimental design is based on a past experiment[1,2] that used the Nova laser facility to simulate young supernova remnants. The target consists of a 0.1 mm CH plastic plug followed by a 0.15 mm vacuum gap and 1 mm of SiO2 aerogel foam. For the experiment, the density of the components and the laser-irradiation conditions are chosen so that the driven shock will produce an observable radiative precursor. Preliminary experimental results from the recent campaign at the OMEGA laser facility will be shown.
1. R.P. Drake, et al, Phys. Rev. Lett. 81, 2068 (1998).
2. R.P. Drake, et al., Phys. Plasmas, 7, 2142 (2000)
Work supported by the U.S. Department of Energy both directly and through the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory