The National Ignition Facility: the world's largest laser

The National Ignition Facility (NIF), currently under construction at the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, is a stadium-sized facility containing a 192-beam, 1.8-Megajoule, 500-Terawatt, ultraviolet laser system together with a 10-meter diameter target chamber with room for nearly 100 experimental diagnostics. When completed, NIF will be the world's largest and most energetic laser experimental system, providing an international center to study inertial confinement fusion and the physics of matter at extreme energy densities and pressures. NIF's 192 energetic laser beams will compress fusion targets to conditions required for thermonuclear burn, liberating more energy than required to initiate the fusion reactions. Other NIF experiments will allow the study of physical processes at temperatures approaching 10/sup 8/ K and 10/sup 11/ bars, conditions that exist naturally only in the interior of stars, planets and in nuclear weapons. NIF has now completed the first phases of its laser commissioning program. The first four beams of NIF have generated 106 kilojoules of infrared light, exceeding design requirements. Operation of single beams at the second harmonic (531 nm) and third harmonic (351 nm) at greater than 10 kilojoules have also exceeded the performance criteria. NlF's target experimental systems are being commissioned and experiments have begun. This paper provides a detailed look the NIF laser systems, laser and optical performance and results from recent laser commissioning shots, and plans for commissioning diagnostics for experiments on NIF.