Effects of non-local electron thermal transport on ablative Rayleigh-Taylor instability

A two-dimensional full Fokker-Planck (FP) simulation code coupled with an i deal fluid equation has been constructed. This code was applied for the num erical simulation of the Rayleigh-Taylor (RT) instability on the directly d riven ablation front. The simulation results show that an accelerated thin foil is preheated by the non-local electron heat transport, the ablation fr ont density is depleted, and the linear growth rate of the RT instability i s suppressed strongly. By investigating the mode structure in the simulatio n, it is found that the peak of the eigen mode shifts toward the corona reg ion by the non-local heat conduction effects. This is the reason why the gr owth rate is reduced. (C) 1999 Elsevier Science S.A. All rights reserved.