[en] The physical fundamentals of pellet dynamics deal with the thermonuclear energy yield, with confinement parameters, the energy gain ratio within the pellet, shock-free compression, the maximum required load, the compression, of hollow spheres, the Rayleigh-Taylor instability, and with pellet problems in heavy ion fusion. (GG)

[en] In these notes, we discuss inertially confined thermonuclear fusion obtained by means of spherically imploded deuterium-tritium fuel. The emphasis is on the 'inner part' of ICF physics, on the implosion dynamics, central fuel ignition, and energy gain, rather than on the problems of beam/target interaction. Section 1 summarizes the basic concept of ICF and recent achievements on fuel compression and briefly indicates advantages and disadvantages of different driver beams. The key parameters for energy gain are discussed in Section 2 in terms of a model, and some recent results on the gas dynamics of central collapse, final compression and formation of the ignition spark are presented in Section 3. (orig.)

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[en] In this talk, work on ICF targets for Heavy Ion Fusion (HIF) performed at the Max-Planck-Institut for Quantum Optics (MPQ) at Garching in the period 1979-1982 is presented. It is part of the German feasibility study of inertial confinement fusion (ICF) by means of heavy ions beams. Within this project target aspects are also studied at the Kernforschungszentrum Karlsruhe with emphasis on thermonuclear burn and transport in a reactor cavity and at the universities in Frankfurt and Darmstadt with focus on symmetry aspects and more-dimensional simulation. (orig./HT)

[en] This talk refers to recent developments of ultrashort TW laser pulses having pulse durations in the order of 10 femto-seconds and less [1]. It describes plans at MPQ to upgrade these pulses to few-Joule energies with PW power. These pulses will be ideally suited for wakefield acceleration, producing very efficiently ultra-bright low-emittance monoenergetic electron beams in the bubble wakefield regime [2]. In this ultra-relativistic regime of laser plasma coupling, the laser pulse drives the wake so strongly that it breaks after the first oscillation and forms a solitary wake, which contains the driving laser pulse in its front-half and traps plasma electrons in its rear-half, accelerating them up to GeV energies [3]. These electron bunches may be converted into secondary beams of X-rays, ions, and other nuclear species. Here we discuss applications to fast ignition research. Fast ignition of precompressed ICF targets depends on efficient coupling of ignitor beam energy to the precompressed fuel core through strongly overdense plasma. This transport involves currents in the order of 100 MA which is dominated by strong magnetic fields and plasma instabilities, in particular current filamentation and coalescence [4]. Also for cone-guided fast ignition, this transport problem arises, be it on a reduced spatial scale. Understanding and control of these nonlinear dynamics is of central importance to make the fast ignition scheme work. The dynamics occur on femtosecond timescales and smaller. Ultrabright X-ray bunches (duration 100 as - 10 fs) produced from bubble electron bunches or also via high harmonics generation from plasma surfaces may open a possibility to time resolve the FI transport instabilities in pump-probe experiments. (Author)

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