Pulsed Power Plasmas

 Introduction

 Pulsed Power Drivers

 X-pinches

 Wire arrays

 Pulsed Power ICF

 Laboratory Astrophysics

Pulsed Power Drivers at UCSD

There are currently two compact, high current pulsed power generators in the HEDP group laboratory. The first produces a maximum current of 80 kA with a zero-to-peak rise-time of 50ns, and the second producing a 250 kA peak current over 150ns. These devices can be charged and fired several times per day, and are operated and maintained by the research staff and students.

X-Pinch Pulser

The X-Pinch pulser is a Marx bank driven system which produces 80 kA with a risetime of 50ns. The Marx bank comprises 4 x 0.1 micro-Farad capacitors which are charged to 50kV, giving a stored energy of about 1 kJ. This discharges into a water filled 1.5 ohm Pulse-Forming Line (PFL) with a single transit time of 26ns which compresses the voltage pulse. This is then delivered into the load region via a self-breaking sulphur hexaflouride (SF6) switch

GenASIS
Generator for Ablation Structure and Implosion Studies

GenASIS is compact pulser based on the Linear Transformer Driver design, which represents the new generation of modular pulsed power units likely to be used in ICF ignition and IFE designs
The UCSD machine comprises 12 x 20 nF capacitors charged in parallel to 75 kV. A small marx unit triggers the main discharge by closing 4 low inductance multi-channel switchblocks. The current is delivered to the load via a coaxial conical power feed designed to maintain a low inductance (~7nH) and optimise energy delivery. Measured load currents are 250kA into a short curcuit load and 210kA into a wire array load.