Key scientific results from recent experiments, modeling tools, and heavy ion accelerator research are summarized that explore ways to investigate the properties of high energy density matter in heavy-ion-driven targets, in particular, strongly-coupled plasmas at 0.01 to 0.1 times solid density for studies of warm dense matter, which is a frontier area in high energy density physics. Pursuit of these near-term objectives has resulted in many innovations that will ultimately benefit heavy ion inertial fusion energy. These include: neutralized ion beam compression and focusing, which hold the promise of greatly improving the stage between the accelerator and the target chamber in a fusion power plant; and the Pulse Line Ion Accelerator (PLIA), which may lead to compact, low-cost modular linac drivers.

The Warp code, developed for heavy-ion driven inertial fusion energy studies, is used to model high intensity ion (and electron) beams. Significant capability has been incorporated in Warp, allowing nearly all sections of an accelerator to be modeled, beginning with the source. Warp has as its core an explicit, three-dimensional, particle-in-cell model. Alongside this is a rich set of tools for describing the applied fields of the accelerator lattice, and embedded conducting surfaces (which are captured at sub-grid resolution). Also incorporated are models with reduced dimensionality: an axisymmetric model and a transverse ''slice'' model. The code takes advantage of modern programming techniques, including object orientation, parallelism, and scripting (via Python). It is at the forefront in the use of the computational technique of adaptive mesh refinement, which has been particularly successful in the area of diode and injector modeling, both steady-state and time-dependent. In the presentation, some of the major aspects of Warp will be overviewed, especially those that could be useful in modeling ECR sources. Warp has been benchmarked against both theory and experiment. Recent results will be presented showing good agreement of Warp with experimental results from the STS500 injector test stand. Additional information can be found on the web page http://hif.lbl.gov/theory/WARP{%5F}summary.html.

Plasma simulations are often rendered challenging by the disparity of scales in time and in space which must be resolved. When these disparities are in distinctive zones of the simulation domain, a method which has proven to be effective in other areas (e.g. fluid dynamics simulations) is the mesh refinement technique. We briefly discuss the challenges posed by coupling this technique with plasma Particle-In-Cell simulations, and present examples of application in Heavy Ion Fusion and related fields which illustrate the effectiveness of the approach. We also report on the status of a collaboration under way at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory between the Applied Numerical Algorithms Group (ANAG) and the Heavy Ion Fusion group to upgrade ANAG's mesh refinement library Chombo to include the tools needed by Particle-In-Cell simulation codes.

We present initial results for the self-consistent beam-cloud dynamics simulations for a sample LHC beam, using a newly developed set of modeling capability based on a merge [1] of the three-dimensional parallel Particle-In-Cell (PIC) accelerator code WARP [2] and the electron-cloud code POSINST [3]. Although the storage ring model we use as a test bed to contain the beam is much simpler and shorter than the LHC, its lattice elements are realistically modeled, as is the beam and the electron cloud dynamics. The simulated mechanisms for generation and absorption of the electrons at the walls are based on previously validated models available in POSINST [3, 4].

To provide a compact high-brightness heavy-ion beam source for Heavy Ion Fusion (HIF), we have been experimenting with merging multi-beamlets in an injector which uses an RF plasma source. An array of converging beamlets was used to produce a beam with the envelope radius, convergence, and ellipticity matched to an electrostatic quadrupole (ESQ) channel. Experimental results were in good quantitative agreement with simulation and have demonstrated the feasibility of this concept. The size of a driver-scale injector system using this approach will be several times smaller than one designed using traditional single large-aperture beams. The success of this experiment has possible significant economical and technical impacts on the architecture of HIF drivers.

We have integrated the electron-cloud code POSINST [1] with WARP [2]--a 3-D parallel Particle-In-Cell accelerator code developed for Heavy Ion Inertial Fusion--so that the two can interoperate. Both codes are run in the same process, communicate through a Python interpreter (already used in WARP), and share certain key arrays (so far, particle positions and velocities). Currently, POSINST provides primary and secondary sources of electrons, beam bunch kicks, a particle mover, and diagnostics. WARP provides the field solvers and diagnostics. Secondary emission routines are provided by the Tech-X package CMEE.

Simulation of designs of an Integrated Beam Experiment (IBX) class accelerator have been carried out. These simulations are an important tool for validating such designs. Issues such as envelope mismatch and emittance growth can be examined in a self-consistent manner, including the details of injection, accelerator transitions, long-term transport, and longitudinal compression. The simulations are three-dimensional and time-dependent, and begin at the source. They continue up through the end of the acceleration region, at which point the data is passed on to a separate simulation of the drift compression. Results are be presented.

During the past two years, significant experimental and theoretical progress has been made in the US heavy ion fusion science program in longitudinal beam compression, ion-beam-driven warm dense matter, beam acceleration, high brightness beam transport; and advanced theory and numerical simulations. Innovations in longitudinal compression of intense ion beams by> 50 X propagating through background plasma enable initial beam target experiments in warm dense matter to begin within the next two years. They are assessing how these new techniques might apply to heavy ion fusion drivers for inertial fusion energy.