Observations on a compressional z-pinch

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Abstract
Observataions on a compressional Z‐pinch, in which the heating is due to a cylindrical shock, are presented. The pinch is formed in hydrogen or argon in a 20 mm diameter quartz tube and is driven by a pulse forming line delivering a current pulse of 100–150 kA reversing after 260 ns. In previously reported work it was shown that the pinch was maintained after current reversal. No instabilities were seen. For hydrogen pinches soft X‐ray observations have been analysed to give radial profiles of the electron temperature and density, and from these, using pressure equilibrium, the current distribution and total current in the pinch is determined. The results show that the current in the pinch does not reverse. This confirms that there is a crowbar of the current through a wall plasma when the pinch is formed and that this is responsible for the long term equilibrium. The stability is compared with theoretical models. The observations of argon pinches show that these also exhibit long term equilibrium and gross stability. An applicatation of the argon pinch to obtain and X‐ray laser at 69.8 nm is discussed.

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