Thermal relaxation of CsI shocked to 45 GPa, with a LiF window, and optical characterization of LiF shocked to 85 GPa

Abstract

Optical pyrometry experiments on opaque shocked solids, such as metals, typically employ a transparent window, such as LiF or Al 2O 3. The window carries the shock front away from the samplewindow interface to avoid spallation, but shock impedance matching is impossible and interface effects are significant. I report on several previously unpublished experiments from two-stage gas gun experiments at LANL. Five experiments involved shocking CsI-LiF sandwiches of known gap with impactors of 1100 Al, to a shock pressure of 40 to 45 GPa in the CsI, in order to test the thermal interface relaxation predictions of Grover and Urtiew. Also, two experiments were on the transparency of shocked LiF. © 2012 American Institute of Physics.