From 25 Years of Fusion at Z Onward to the Next Generation of Pulsed Power

The Sandia Z facility has the world’s largest pulsed power machine and includes the multi-kJ Z-Beamlet laser. Z has been used for inertial confinement fusion research for over 25 years, in addition to supporting other high energy density science [1] . Until 2006, wire array z-pinches were used to produce the highest soft x-ray power and total x-ray energy of any laboratory facility at the time using two differet indirectdrive fusion concepts. These remain of future interest, but the largest uncertainty in scaling is the capsule physics that is best addressed using the National Ignition Facility. Today, research on Z is studying the use of magnetic pressure to directly compress solid liners containing fusion fuel [2] , such as the Magnetized Liner Inertial Fusion (MagLIF) concept that demonstrated the fundamental principles of magnetoinertial fusion in the laboratory [3] .