Lasers for inertial confinement fusion driven by high explosives

Various conditions required for pumping of lasers for inertial confinement fusion (ICF) power plants, are discussed. Chemical high explosives are used for the pumping of megajoule lasers, due to which lasers become less expensive by orders of magnitude, and more compact. One of the advantage of lasers for inertial confinement fusion, is their good standoff property from the thermonuclear micro-explosion. The high explosive must be simultaneously ignited throughout the entire volume occupied, for the direct conversion of the chemical energy into a laser pulse. The high explosive must be given a layered structure, with the thickness of the layers larger than the optical path length at low laser radiation intensities. All the chemical energy is transformed into a flash of coherent light, instead into kinetic energy and heat of a fast moving detonation wave, when pumping lasers with high explosives.