Simulation of the Preheating Effects on the Discharging of Magnetized Liner Inertial Fusion

Benefiting from laser preheating and axial magnetization, magnetized liner inertial fusion (MagLIF) has great application potential because it can effectively reduce the difficulties to realize the controlled fusion in theory. However, much attention has been paid to the improvement of laser energy deposition efficiency in current research, while the influence of preheating parameters on the MagLIF process and implosion is ignored. For this reason, the one-dimensional integrated simulation code, MIST, is used here to study the preheating effect on the fusion discharging in MagLIF process. Based on the method of parameter scanning, starting from a simple model, the studies of the influences of relevant parameters on implosion results are gradually advanced. The simulation results show that preheating is a necessary condition for the success of MagLIF configuration, and the best preheating time is the moment when the liner is about to compress the fuel. The design principle of preheating is to allow the fuel to acquire as smoothly distributed high temperature as possible, and the central local heating mode is more advantageous when the ignition fails. If the laser is preheated, the shorter pulse width will be better. For driving ability of ZR facility, the optimal liner height is 1.0 cm. These results are not only helpful to understand laser preheating mechanism and effect during MagLIF process, but also providing useful guidance for the design of the detail load parameters of MagLIF configuration.