Paper 13358-22
Paper 13358-22
Lessons learned and ongoing research at Electra: a rep-rate excimer laser facility (Invited Paper)
28 January 2025 • 1:30 PM - 2:00 PM PST | Moscone South, Room 76 (Lower Mezz)
Abstract
Electra is a repetitively pulsed, electron beam pumped excimer laser at the Naval Research Laboratory that is developing the technologies that can meet the Inertial Fusion Energy (IFE) requirements for durability, efficiency, and cost. The technologies developed on Electra are designed to be directly scalable to a full size fusion power plant beam line. Recently, the electron beam diodes of the Electra facility have been modified to a reduced aperture to increase the power deposition rate for efficient argon fluoride at 193 nm operations. Electra has achieved over 700 J in KrF (248 nm) operation per shot and 200 J per shot in ArF operation. Gain measurements at 193 nm indicate higher wall-plug efficiency for ArF (10%) than KrF (7%). The native emission of argon fluoride bandwidth exceeds 10 THz which is broader than the krypton fluoride bandwidth.
Presenter
U.S. Naval Research Lab. (United States)
Dr. Matthew F. Wolford is the Head of the Electron Beam Science & Applications Section (6733), Laser Plasma Branch within the Plasma Physics Division at the U.S. Naval Research Laboratory. The section houses the Electra laser facility. The Electra facility consists of a 500 keV counter-propagating repetition rate (up to 5 Hz) electron beam facility formerly used for development of krypton fluoride (KrF) lasers for inertial fusion energy (IFE) and presently argon fluoride (ArF) lasers for IFE. In addition, the facility has a 10 J Nd:Glass Green laser for bandwidth development for larger inertial confinement (ICF) laser facilities as well as a 10 Hz pulsed power system for durability studies. Dr. Wolford received the B.S. degree in chemistry from Binghamton University, Binghamton, NY in 1995 and the Ph.D. degree in chemistry from the University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, PA in 2002.