Designing of Aspherically-Diverging, Multi-Interface Experiments to Model Rayleigh-Taylor Growth in Supernovae
Abstract
One branch of work in the laboratory astrophysics community has been focused on developing the understanding of hydrodynamic mixing in supernovae. Current experiments have been limited to studying these processes in planar systems due in large part to limitations of drive energy. The National Ignition Facility (NIF) is now capable of providing experiments with far more than ten times the energy than has been previously available on laser facilities, enabling supernova-relevant hydrodynamics experiments in which hydrodynamic instabilities develop from a blast-wave driven through multiple, coupled interfaces in a diverging system. This presentation discusses the design of such target designs, both spherical and aspheric, in which the relative masses of the layers are scaled to those within the star. It reports scaling simulations with CALE to model the global dynamics of such experiments. The simulations investigate the diagnosability and experimental value of different designs using a variety of materials. Simulation results exploring whether an experiment investigating aspheric supernova is a feasible extension from the current design and what observable dynamics would be able to be expected will also be reported, including multiple drive and experimental geometries.
This research was sponsored by LLNL through contract LLNL B56128 and by the NNSA through DOE Research Grant DE-FG52-04NA00064.- Publication:
-
American Astronomical Society Meeting Abstracts #216
- Pub Date:
- May 2010
- Bibcode:
- 2010AAS...21641001G