Measurements of Magneto-Rayleigh-Taylor Instability Growth during the Implosion of Initially Solid Al Tubes Driven by the 20-MA, 100-ns Z Facility

Abstract

The first controlled experiments measuring the growth of the magneto-Rayleigh-Taylor instability in fast ($\sim 100\mathrm{ns}$) Z-pinch plasmas are reported. Sinusoidal perturbations on the surface of an initially solid Al tube (liner) with wavelengths of $25–400\mu \mathrm{m}$ were used to seed the instability. Radiographs with $15\mu \mathrm{m}$ resolution captured the evolution of the outer liner surface. Comparisons with numerical radiation magnetohydrodynamic simulations show remarkably good agreement down to $50\mu \mathrm{m}$ wavelengths.