Numerical simulation of implosion and burn of D–T ignitor/D3He fuel pellet for D3He inertial confinement fusion reactor

Abstract

A parameter study of implosion, burn, and gain of D–T ignitor/D3He fuel pellets is presented for a D3He inertial confinement fusion reactor. It is found from burn simulation that attaining a quasi-isobaric state with a temperature of 4 keV and pR value of 2.5 g/cm2 for the D–T ignitor and 0.8 keV and 9.5 g/cm2 for the D3He main fuel would suffice to obtain a pellet gain of ∼40–50 required for the D3He reactor. With 30-MJ laser irradiation and the coupling efficiency of 10%, the density of the target is assumed to be imploded to 5,000 times the liquid density. However, in the implosion simulation to realize the above configuration it is found that after void closure the central hot D–T ignitor region is ignited, while the bulk of the D3He main fuel is still imploding with high velocities. This preignition of the D–T ignitor leads to a low compression of the main fuel and prevents the D–T/D3He pellet from obtaining the required pellet gain. The pellet gain obtained is only ∼3.