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Laser-produced magnetic-Rayleigh-Taylor unstable plasma slabs in a 20 T magnetic field (1910.13778v1)
Published 30 Oct 2019 in physics.plasm-ph
Abstract: Magnetized laser-produced plasmas are central to many novel laboratory astrophysics and inertial confinement fusion studies, as well as in industrial applications. Here we provide the first complete description of the three-dimensional dynamics of a laser-driven plasma plume expanding in a 20 T transverse magnetic field. The plasma is collimated by the magnetic field into a slender, rapidly elongating slab, whose plasma-vacuum interface is unstable to the growth of the "classical", fluid-like magnetized Rayleigh-Taylor instability.