Mass Production Methods for Fabrication of Inertial Fusion Targets

The High Average Power Laser (HAPL) Program is a national program to develop Inertial Fusion Energy with lasers (http://aries.ucsd.edu/HAPL/), direct drive targets and solid wall chambers. General Atomics is currently constructing and will operate a Mass Production Layering Experiment (MPLX) System. The MPLX System will demonstrate the filling and layering of approximately 700 plastic spherical targets (4 mm diameter plastic shells) simultaneously in a fluidized bed as a batch process in less than a day. In addition the system will be able to characterize a single deuterium filled and layered cryogenically-cooled target. This paper details hardware being developed and tested for the building of this system.