Current losses in wire array Z-pinches on the Z generator

Summary form only given. Compact tungsten wire array z-pinches imploded on the Z generator at Sandia National Laboratories have proven to be a powerful, reproducible, x-ray source. Wire arrays have also been used in dynamic hohlraum radiation flow experiments, and as an intense K-shell source, while the generator has been used extensively for isentropic compression experiments. A problem shared by all these applications is current loss preventing the ∼20MA drive current from being reliably coupled to the load. This potentially degrades performance, while uncertainties in how this loss is described limits our predictive capability.