CHARACTERISTICS OF DENSE PLASMA FOCUS DISCHARGE

The dense plasma focus discharge is produced in a hydromagnetic coaxial plasma accelerator. The final heating and compression of the plasma is accomplished by a partial conversion of the stored magnetic energy residing in the region behind the current sheath to plasma energy. The electrical behavior of the discharge is examined to determine the fraction of the initial energy involved in mechanical sheath motion, inductive storage in the accelerator, and Ohmic losses associated with the external and plasma discharge. Many analysis of this kind of datum show no definite correlation between the energy converted and neutron production. Presumably this arises from a lack of information as to how the collapse uses this energy and to the amount of plasma ejected from the dense plasma region during the collapse. From soft x-ray pinhole and Schlieren photographs, the collapse and the development of the dense plasma is unquestionably a two-dimensional pinch compression.