NIF and Photon Science
LLNL-Led Team Receives DOE Award to Establish IFE Hub
The Energy Department has awarded a four-year, $16 million project to a multi-institutional team led by LLNL to accelerate inertial fusion energy science and technology. This effort will be carried out by a newly established hub named IFE-STARFIRE.
One year after LLNL achieved fusion ignition at NIF, we have expanded our special report The Age of Ignition with more stories explaining how scientific history was made.
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LLNL set a new record for laser energy at NIF, firing 2.2 megajoules (MJ) of energy for the first time on an ignition target. The experiment achieved ignition for the fourth time and delivered the second-highest neutron yield..
LLNL’s National Security Engineering Division and Defense Technologies Engineering Division have long histories of providing infrastructure for NIF’s operations.
With 7,500 large optics, 26,000 small optics, and more than 66,000 control points, NIF is a remarkable engineering and technology success story.
Jeff Wisoff, NIF&PS principal associate director, and Jean-Michel Di Nicola, Laser Science & Technology and Systems Engineering organization co-program director, were selected as Optica fellows.
Ibo Matthews, who began his LLNL career helping mitigate NIF optics damage, and Frank Graziani, who works to foster academic collaborations in HED research, were selected as 2023 American Physical Society fellows.
A LLNL-led project with industry and academic partners aims to use lasers to rapidly generate muons—subatomic particles that help us see inside impossible places.
LLNL researchers have adapted their novel metasurface process in a way that could transform waveplate technology for high-power laser systems such as NIF.
