Survey of design points for low wire count PRS loads

Summary form only given. Plasma radiation source (PRS) loads of a few larger diameter wires offer a relatively unexplored path to energetic implosions. Such loads with larger initial wire diameters and load radii will provide lower inductance at the expense of more precursor plasma involvement. In contrast to closed arrays with hundreds of fine wires, this relatively unexplored path to energetic implosions would use two or three load wires of appropriately heavier mass and aims to create a focused axial stagnation of dense wire cores amidst the assembled precursor plasma. Initial studies of low wire count loads show promising results with respect to initial inductance and available stagnation energy. Here we examine the trade space of stagnation energy, machine current, implosion time, and delivered mass for several drivers in common use. In contrast to earlier WDM formulations with inductance matrix elements good only in the thin wire limit, the present work makes full use of a new analytic result that accounts for proximity effects among the wire cores and a direct Lorentz gauge field solver to treat the TM mode set at the midplane in the pinch region. The current elements associated with the coronal plasma are then axial filaments constrained by the local conductivity, thermal gradients, and fluid velocity. A fluid particle representation enables the resolution of precursor plasma flows and wire core stagnation. Radiation yields are estimated with tabular CRE methods.