Overview of MEGa-ray-based Nuclear Materials Management Activities at the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory

摘要

Mono-energetic gamma-ray (MEGa-ray) sources can be readily produced via the optimized interaction of pulsed lasers with relativistic electron beams (inverse laser-Compton scattering). Such sources provide unrivaled photon source monochromaticity, pulse brightness and flux. In the MeV spectral range, MEGa-ray sources can be greater than 15 orders of magnitude higher peak brilliance than the world's largest synchrotrons. Optimized MEGa-ray sources can efficiently excite the isotope-specific resonant structure of the nucleus, i.e. nuclear resonance fluorescence (NRF) and can in turn be used in unique ways to detect the presence, location and amount of specific isotopes within complex objects. A review of the design, optimization and development of past and future MEGa-ray machines as well as a survey of nuclear applications being pursued with them at the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL) is presented.