Post Author: Maren W. Hatch
During experiments in October and November 2025, a Load Current Multiplier (LCM) was successfully tested on the Mykonos pulsed-power facility, constituting the first deployment of a compact LCM hardware design on a low-inductance pulsed-power system. The experiments demonstrated a current multiplication factor of >1.5X at various charge voltages, thereby validating the underlying design and setting a new facility peak current record.
(right) (a) LCM hardware that was shot on Mykonos, (b) Electrical current traces for nominal (dashed) and amplified current (solid).
This proof of concept and successful implementation of an LCM facilitates a path to the delivery of ~40 MA currents to select low-inductance loads on the Z facility, thereby opening new regimes for advanced inertial confinement fusion (ICF) target designs and significantly relaxing driver requirements for attaining high thermonuclear yields in next-generation facilities.
Significant operational milestones for the Mykonos accelerator were achieved during this campaign, including new records for daily physics shot execution (24 shots in a day), as well as new records for the cumulative number of shots completed during an experimental research campaign (91 shots).