Studies on dynamical shell formation for direct-drive laser fusion

We consider a recently proposed target concept for laser-driven inertial confinement fusion [V. Goncharov et al., Phys. Rev. Lett., 125, 065001 (2020)]. A homogeneous sphere is irradiated by an appropriately timed laser pulse, leading to the (dynamic) formation of a dense shell. This shell is then imploded to high velocity to achieve the conditions needed for thermonuclear ignition. Here we study, by means of one-dimensional and two-dimensional simulations, a scaled-down target suitable for a proof-of-principle experiment, which can be performed on the laser OMEGA at the Laboratory for Laser Energetics, Rochester University.