Visualization of target inspection data at the National Ignition Facility

As the National Ignition Facility continues its campaign to achieve ignition, new methods and tools will be required to measure the quality of the target capsules used to achieve this goal. Techniques have been developed to measure capsule surface features using a phase-shifting diffraction interferometer and Leica Microsystems confocal microscope. These instruments produce multi-gigabyte datasets which consist of tens to hundreds of files. Existing software can handle viewing a small subset of an entire dataset, but none can view a dataset in its entirety. Additionally, without an established mode of transport that keeps the target capsules properly aligned throughout the assembly process, a means of aligning the two dataset coordinate systems is needed. The goal of this project is to develop web based software utilizing WebGL which will provide high level overview visualization of an entire dataset, with the capability to retrieve finer details on demand, in addition to facilitating alignment of multiple datasets with one another based on common features that have been visually identified by users of the system.     

The National Ignition Facility and Industry

The mission of the National Ignition Facility is to achieve ignition and gain in inertial confinement fusion targets in the laboratory. The facility will be used for defense applications such as weapons physics and weapons effects testing, and for civilian applications such as fusion energy development and fundamental studies of matter at high temperatures and densities. The National Ignition Facility construction project will require the best of our construction industries and its success will depend on the best products offered by hundreds of the nation's high technology companies. Three-fourths of the construction costs will be invested in industry. This article reviews the design, cost and schedule, and required industrial involvement associated with the construction project.     

National Ignition Facility and managing location,component, and state

The National Ignition Facility (NIF) at the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory is a stadium-sized facility that contains a 192-beam, 1.8-MJ, 500-TW, ultraviolet laser system coupled with a 10-m diameter target chamber. There are over 6200 Line Replaceable Units (LRUs) comprised of more than 104,000 serialized parts that make up the NIF. Each LRU is a modular unit typically composed of a mechanical housing, laser optics (glass, lenses, or mirrors), and utilities. To date, there are more than 120,000 data sets created to characterize the attributes of these parts. Greater than 51,000 Work Permits have been issued to install, maintain, and troubleshoot the components. One integrated system is used to manage these data, and more. The Location Component and State (LoCoS) system is a web application built using Java Enterprise Edition technologies and is accessed by over 1200 users. It is either directly or indirectly involved with each aspect of NIF work activity, and interfaces with ten external systems including the Integrated Computer Control System (ICCS) and the Laser Performance Operations Model (LPOM). Besides providing business functionality, LoCoS also acts as the NIF enterprise service bus. In this role, numerous integration approaches had to be adopted including: file exchange, database sharing, queuing, and web services in order to accommodate various business, technical, and security requirements. Architecture and implementation decisions are discussed.     

National Ignition Facility TestController for automated and manual testing

The Controls and Information Systems (CIS) organization for the National Ignition Facility (NIF) has developed controls, configuration and analysis software applications that combine for several million lines of code. The team delivers updates throughout the year, from major releases containing hundreds of changes to patch releases containing a small number of focused updates. To ensure the quality of each delivery, manual and automated tests are performed using the NIF TestController test infrastructure. The TestController system provides test inventory management, test planning, automated and manual test execution, release testing summaries and results search, all through a web browser interface. As part of the three-stage software testing strategy, the NIF TestController system helps plan, evaluate and track the readiness of each release to the NIF production environment.After several years of use in testing NIF software applications, the TestController's manual testing features have been leveraged for verifying the installation and operation of NIF Target Diagnostic hardware. The TestController recorded its first test results in 2004. Today, the system has recorded the execution of more than 160,000 tests and continues to play a central role in ensuring that NIF hardware and software meet the requirements of a high reliability facility. This paper describes the TestController system and discusses its use in assuring the quality of software delivered to the NIF.     

Correcting raw diagnostic data for oscilloscope recording system distortions at the National Ignition Facility

The National Ignition Facility (NIF) is now producing experimental results for the study of inertial confinement fusion (ICF). These results are captured by complex diagnostic systems and are key to achieving NIF's goal to demonstrate thermonuclear burn of deuterium and tritium fuel in a laboratory setting. High bandwidth gamma-ray fusion-burn measurements and soft X-ray indirect and direct drive energetic measurements are both captured with oscilloscope recording systems that distort or modulate the raw data. The Shot Data Analysis team has developed signal processing corrections for these oscilloscope recording systems through an automated engine. Once these corrections are applied, accurate fundamental quantities can be discerned.     

Overview of the Preliminary Safety Analysis of the National Ignition Facility

The National Ignition Facility (NIF) is a proposed U.S. Department of Energy inertial confinement laser fusion facility. The candidate sites for locating the NIF are: Los Alamos National Laboratory, Sandia National Laboratory, New Mexico, the Nevada Test Site, and Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL), the preferred site. The NIF will operate by focusing 192 individual laser beams onto a tiny deuterium-tritium target located at the center of a spherical target chamber. The NIF has been classified as a low hazard, radiological facility on the basis of a preliminary hazards analysis and according to the DOE methodology for facility classification. This requires that a safety analysis report be prepared under DOE Order 5481.1B, Safety Analysis and Review System. A Preliminary Safety Analysis Report (PSAR) has been approved, which documents and evaluates the safety issues associated with the construction, operation, and decommissioning of the NIF.     

Software solutions manage the definition,operation, maintenance and configuration control of the National Ignition Facility

The National Ignition Facility (NIF) is the world's largest laser composed of millions of individual parts brought together to form one massive assembly. Maintaining control of the physical definition, status and configuration of this structure is a monumental undertaking yet critical to the validity of experimental data and the safe operation of the facility. A major programmatic challenge is to deploy software solutions to effectively manage the definition, build, operation, and maintenance, and configuration control of all components of NIF. The strategy for meeting this challenge involves deploying and integrating an enterprise application suite of solutions consisting of both Commercial-Off-The-Shelf (COTS) products and custom developed software.This paper describes how this strategy has been implemented along with a discussion on the successes realized and the ongoing challenges associated with this approach.     

2011 Status of the automatic alignment system for the National Ignition Facility

Automated alignment for the National Ignition Facility (NIF) is accomplished using a large-scale parallel control system that directs 192 laser beams along the 300 m optical path. The beams are then focused down to a 50 μ spot in the middle of the target chamber. The entire process is completed in less than 50 min. The alignment system commands 9000 stepping motors for extremely precise adjustment of mirrors and other optics. 41 control loops per beamline perform parallel processing services running on a LINUX cluster to analyze high-resolution images of the beams and their references. This paper describes the status the NIF automatic alignment system and the challenges encountered as NIF development has transitioned from building the laser, to becoming a research project supporting a 24 h, 7 days/week laser facility. NIF is now a continuously operated system where performance monitoring is increasingly more critical for operation, maintenance, and commissioning tasks. Equipment wear and the effects of high energy neutrons from fusion experiments are issues which affect alignment efficiency and accuracy. New sensors needing automatic alignment assistance are common. System modifications to improve efficiency and accuracy are prevalent. Handling these evolving alignment and maintenance needs while minimizing the impact on NIF experiment schedule is expected to be an on-going challenge for the planned 30 year operational life of NIF.     

美国国家点火装置中低温定位器产生的背景中子通量密度的计算

W.C.Mead等人[1]对美国国家点火装置(NIF)内的氘氚燃料反应产生的信号中子与低温定位器(CTP)、靶室壁反应产生的背景中子和背景光子的通量密度进行了计算。论文对同一系统进行再次研究,得到与W.C.Mead不同的结论。论文对W.C.Mead等人的研究进行勘误和拓展,使用MCNP对NIF中CTP和靶室壁对背景中子和背景光子的产生情况进行了计算和分析。通过计算在靶室内不同半径不同角度上的背景中子通量密度,确定了在靶室内最佳信噪比的角度,同时对探测器布置在靶室内的位置提出了建议。并且在W.C.Mead等人的研究基础上,改变CTP在靶室中的位置,计算并对比了CTP在靶室内不同位置上,所产生的背景中子和背景光子通量密度。     

The Potential of Fast Ignition and Related Experiments with a Petawatt Laser Facility

A model of energy gain induced by fast ignition of thermonuclear burn in compressed deuterium-tritium fuel, is used to show the potential for 300× gain with a driver energy of 1 MJ, if the National Ignition Facility (NIF) were to be adapted for fast ignition. The physics of fast ignition has been studied using a petawatt laser facility at the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory. Laser plasma interaction in a preformed plasma on a solid target leads to relativistic self-focusing evidenced by x-ray images. Absorption of the laser radiation transfers energy to an intense source of relativistic electrons. Good conversion efficiency into a wide angular distribution is reported. Heating by the electrons in solid density CD₂ produces 0.5 to 1 keV temperature, inferred from the D-D thermo-nuclear neutron yield.     

Fusion Core Imaging Experiment Based on the Shenguang Ⅱ Facility

A laser fusion experiment was performed based on the Shenguang Ⅱ Facility ,An image of thermonuclear burning region was obtained with a Fresnel zone plate-coded imaging technique,where the laser-driver target was served as an α-particle soure ,and the coded image obtained in the experiment was reconstructed by a numerical way.     

Fusion Core Imaging Experiment Based on the Shenguang II Facility

A laser fusion experiment was performed based on the Shenguang II facility. An image of thermonuclear burning region was obtained with a Fresnel zone plate-coded imaging technique, where the laser-driven target was served as an a-particle source, and the coded image obtained in the experiment was reconstructed by a numerical way.     

γ全吸收型探测装置探测效率的实验与模拟

为精确测量keV能区中子俘获反应截面,中国原子能科学研究院核数据重点实验室基于中国散裂中子源反角白光中子源建成了国内首套γ全吸收型BaF₂探测装置。为获得重要的实验参数装置对γ射线的探测效率曲线,对单个BaF₂探测器模块能谱的测量数据与模拟结果进行比较。结果表明,测量¹³⁷Cs和⁶⁰Co源得到的实验结果与MCNP和GEANT4的模拟结果吻合较好,验证了模拟计算得到的探测效率曲线的可靠性,可用于中子俘获反应截面的在线测量。     

A Data Acquisition and Experiment Control System for High-Data-Rate Experiments at the National Synchrotron Light Source

A data acquisition and experiment control system for experiments at the Biology Small-Angle X-ray Scattering Station at the National Synchrotron Light Source has been developed based on a multiprocessor, functionally distributed architecture. The system controls an x-ray monochromator and spectrometer and acquires data from any one of three position-sensitive x-ray detectors. The average data rate from the position-sensitive detector is ~ 106 events/sec. Data is stored in a one megaword histogramming memory. The experiments at this Station require that x-ray diffraction patterns be correlated with timed stimuli at the sample. Therefore, depending on which detector is in use, up to 103 time-correlated diffraction patterns may be held in the system memory simultaneously. The operation of the system is functionally distributed over four processors communicating via a multiport memory.     

Design Features and Commissioning of the Versatile Experiment Spherical Torus (VEST) at Seoul National University

A new spherical torus called VEST (Versatile Experiment Spherical Torus) is designed,constructed and successfully commissioned at Seoul National University.A unique design feature of the VEST is two partial solenoid coils installed at both vertical ends of a center stack,which can provide sufficient magnetic fluxes to initiate tokamak plasmas while keeping a low aspect ratio configuration in the central region.According to initial double null merging start-up scenario using the partial solenoid coils,appropriate power supplies for driving a toroidal field coil,outer poloidal field coils,and the partial solenoid coils are fabricated and successfully commissioned.For reliable start-up,a preionization system with two cost-effective homemade magnetron power supplies is also prepared.In addition,magnetic and spectroscopic diagnostics with appropriate data acquisition and control systems are well prepared for initial operation of the device.The VEST is ready for tokamak plasma operation by completing and commissioning most of the designed components.     

Analysis of System Thermal Hydraulic Responses for Passive Safety Injection Experiment at ROSA-IV/Large Scale Test Facility

An experiment was conducted at the ROSA-IV/Large Scale Test Facility (LSTF) on the performance of a gravity-driven emergency core coolant (ECC) injection system attached to a pressurized water reactor (PWR). Such a gravity-driven injection system, though not used in the current-generation PWRs, is proposed for future reactor designs. The experiment was performed to identify key phenomena peculiar to the operation of a gravity injection system and to provide data base for code assessment against such phenomena. The simulated injection system consisted of a tank which was initially filled with cold water of the same pressure as the primary system. The tank was connected at its top and bottom, respectively, to the cold leg and the vessel downcomer. The injection into the downcomer was driven primarily by the static head difference between the cold water in the tank and the hot water in the pressure balance line (PBL) connecting the cold leg to the tank top. The injection flow was oscillatory after the flow through the PBL became two-phase flow. The experiment was post-test analyzed using a JAERI modified version of the RELAP5/MOD2 code. The code calculation simulated reasonably well the system responses observed in the experiment, and suggested that the oscillations in the injection flow was caused by oscillatory liquid holdup in the PBL connecting the cold leg to tank top.     

Description of a Drift Chamber System Employed in an Experiment at Brookhaven National Laboratory

We have designed and constructed a drift chamber1 system containing /m=~/250 wires for use in a double arm magnetic spectrometer experiment at the Brookhaven National Laboratory AGS. Our basic experimental constraints were the need for (i) good detection efficiency (ii) a reasonably linear relationship between drift time and position (iii) long term stability in a high particle flux environment and (iv) ease of construction. In addition we also constructed our own electronics for reading out this drift time information with much the same set of restrictions.     

Performance Characteristics of the 30 MeV Three-Stage Tandem Facility at BNL

The 30 MeV 3-stage Van de Graaff facility at Brookhaven National Laboratory achieved the desired operating specifications on July 28, 1970 and has been in operation on various research programs since. The facility consists of two MP Tandem Van de Graaff accelerators arranged in line with a negative ion source installed in the terminal of the first accelerator. The two accelerators can either be used as separate Tandem accelerators or together in a 3-stage configuration. Proton energies as high as 30.5 MeV with currents as high as 4 microamperes have been obtained.