Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory



December 8, 2022

Burning Plasma Team Receives AwardThe Burning Plasma Team receives the 2022 John Dawson Award for Excellence in Plasma Physics Research by the APS at the 64th American Physical Society-Division of Plasma Physics annual conference in Spokane, Washington, in October. The team is made up of members from the Lab and other institutions. Photos by Félicie Albert

Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL) was well represented at the recent 64th American Physical Society Division of Plasma Physics (APS-DPP) annual meeting in Spokane, Washington—and the event was widely praised as a welcome return to a largely in-person conference.

The attendees were keen on learning the latest developments of experiments at NIF, the world’s largest and most energetic laser, according to Senior Physicist Laurent Divol, who presented a review of the progress on NIF’s inertial confinement fusion since the Lab’s 1.35-megajoule milestone on Aug. 8, 2021.

“Many talks showed that we are making good progress, understand the sources of performance variations in recent shots on NIF, and have a credible multi-branched path forward to attain more robustness and higher yields in the near future,” said Divol, whose presentation was titled “Dynamics and variability in near unity gain inertial confinement fusion implosions on the National Ignition Facility.” 

Divol added: “What we do on NIF is a clear proof of principle for ICF and the whole fusion energy field is ‘energized’ by our recent results.”

In all, more than 1,900 registrants gathered from Oct. 17-21 in Spokane, with another 350 registrants attending remotely for presentations, poster sessions, and seminars, according to LLNL physicist Denise Hinkel, chair of the APS-DPP. That was more than double the number of in-person participants at last year’s conference in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. LLNL was represented by nearly 60 registrants.

“Everybody was visibly very happy to be back in person at a large conference and the overall vibe was positive and collaborative,” Divol said.

Félicie Albert, deputy director of LLNL’s High Energy Density (HED) Science Center and a NIF scientist, praised all of the Lab’s speakers, who she said “gave well-received talks showing the depth and breadth of what we do at the Lab. It was also great to catch up with people we hadn’t seen for a while due to the pandemic.” 

Alison ChristophersonLLNL scientist Alison Christopherson gives a talk on her research, which won the APS Marshall N. Rosenbluth Outstanding Doctoral Thesis award.

The presentations from LLNL physicists highlighted NIF & Photon Science research, including transfer learning and multi-fidelity modeling of laser-driven ion acceleration, measurement of improved stability to achieve higher compression in ICF, progress on magnetized indirect-drive implosions, and control of low-mode drive asymmetry in an efficient long pulse, low-density filled hohlraum.

Highlights involving Lab registrants included:

  • LLNL scientist Alison Christopherson, who gave an invited talk on her doctoral research, “Alpha-heating analysis of burning plasma experiments on the National Ignition Facility and their companion dudded fuel implosions,” which won the APS Marshall N. Rosenbluth Outstanding Doctoral Thesis award.  
    “Receiving the award was a great honor because it was chosen from a selection of other great works,” Christopherson said.
  • The Burning Plasma Team, which received the 2022 John Dawson Award for Excellence in Plasma Physics Research by the APS. The team, which includes members from the Lab and other institutions, was cited “for the first laboratory demonstration of a burning deuterium-tritium plasma where alpha heating dominates the plasma energetics.” The team achieved a burning plasma state in November 2020 and Feburary 2021 at NIF.
  • Denise Hinkel, who was honored for her APS-DPP leadership role.
  • Physicists Annie Kritcher and Ronnie Shepherd, who were both selected as 2022 APS fellows. Kritcher is a team lead within the ICF program, where she oversees the integrated modeling of indirect-drive fusion designs fielded at NIF. Shepherd, a physicist in the Physical and Life Sciences’ Physics Division, is the director of outreach at the High Energy Density (HED) Science Center.
Blagoje DjordjevicLLNL physicist Blagoje Djordjevic gives a presentation on “Transfer learning and multi-fidelity modeling of laser-driven ion acceleration.”

Divol noted that fusion startups, both ICF and magnetic fusion, had a large presence at the conference with posters, scientific talks, special sessions, and booths, and generated some excitement at the conference. He said it appears that there are increasingly more opportunities for scientists graduating in plasma physics and related fields.

For LLNL physicist Blagoje Djordjevic, the Spokane conference was his first time back to APS DPP in person since 2019 and said it was “very exciting for me.

“DPP is my favorite conference and I love seeing how people are pushing the boundaries of plasma physics,” he said. “It was great to be able to see not only old faces in person once again, but also to finally meet in person several people I had only otherwise met over teleconferencing.”

Djordjevic also gave a presentation on “Transfer learning and multi-fidelity modeling of laser-driven ion acceleration.”

He and Lab physicist Raspberry Simpson praised the improved organization of the hybrid meeting, which was the result of a joint effort between APS Meetings and the DPP Executive Committee.

“I think the online and virtual components were integrated really well this year and it felt like a more cohesive conference,” Simpson said.

Hinkel said “the virtual component of the hybrid meeting was improved, and this was noted by virtual attendees.  Every oral session was live streamed.”

Laurent DivolLLNL Senior Physicist Laurent Divol presents a review on the progress on NIF’s inertial confinement fusion (ICF) experiments at the 64th American Physical Society-Division of Plasma Physics annual conference.

She also said conference organizers “are fully cognizant that there is room for further improvement.”

The APS cited the following Burning Plasma Team members for the 2022 John Dawson Award for Excellence in Plasma Physics Research: Ben Bachmann, Kevin Baker, Richard Bionta, Debbie Callahan, Daniel Casey, Dan Clark, Jean-Michel Di Nicola, Laurent Divol, Tilo Doeppner, John Edwards, Maria Gatu Johnson, Kelly Hahn, Ed Hartouni, Matthias Hohenberger, Omar Hurricane, Shahab Khan, Annie Kritcher, Nino Landen, Brian MacGowan, Andrew MacPhee, Marty Marinak, Kevin Meaney, Alastair Moore, Abbas Nikroo, Art Pak, Prav Patel, Joe Ralph, Harry Robey, Steven Ross, Scott Sepke, Riccardo Tommasini, Petr Volegov, Chris Weber, Bruno Van Wonterghem, Chris Young, Alex Zylstra, and the NIF-ICF team.

The other NIF-related invited talks from LLNL staff included:

  • Félicie Albert: “Principles and applications of x-ray sources based on laser-plasma acceleration.”
  • Benjamin Bachmann: “Measuring dark mix at stagnation of cryogenically layered capsule implosions at the NIF.”
  • Alexandre Do: “Experimental measurement of improved stability to achieve higher compression in ICF.”
  • Nobuhiko Izumi: “Control of low-mode drive asymmetry in an efficient long pulse low-density filled hohlraum.”
  • Richard Kraus: “Measuring the melting curve of iron at super-Earth core conditions.”
  • Nami Li: “Small ELM dynamics and its impact on the SOL width scaling.”
  • Nikolas Logan: “Improved particle confinement with resonant magnetic perturbations in DIII-D tokamak H-mode plasmas.”
  • Alison Saunders: “Experimental observations of laser-driven tin ejecta microlet interactions.”
  • Raspberry Simpson: “Investigation of boosted proton energies through proton radiography of target normal sheath acceleration fields in the multi-ps regime.”
  • Hong Sio: “Progress on magnetized indirect-drive implosions at the National Ignition Facility.”

More information:
“Fusion Milestone Creates Buzz at Hybrid APS Plasma Physics Meeting,” NIF & Photon Science News, January 26, 2022

—Jon Kawamoto

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