Validation of non-local electron transport approaches, application to shock ignition

For laser-plasma interactions at moderate intensities the conduction of heat cannot be captured by the classical Spitzer-HÄarm expression and an accurate treatment for non-local electron transport is necessary. A suitable method needs to discriminate between local electrons, that behave in accordance to the classical thermal conduction, and non-local electrons, that have very long mean free paths and di®use energy all over the physical domain. Two widely known and promising schemes are examined in detail: SNB [Schurtz et al. PoP (2000)] and CMG [Manheimer et al. PoP (2008)]. Both models have been implemented in the hydrodynamic code DUED and benchmarked against the fully kinetic Vlasov- Fokker-Plank codes OSHUN and KETS. Both schemes calculate the right amount of °ux in the limit of steep temperature gradients, and for the test problem of hot- spot relaxation they are both generally well-behaved at hydrodynamic time-scales (» 30¿ei). However, at kinetic time-scales (up to » 30¿ei) the SNB model better approximates the kinetic solution. 1D and 2D shock ignition simulations will be presented and the role of non-local e®ects in the implosion and ignition stages will be discussed.