Experimental Study of the Hydrodynamics of High Mach

Acknowledgements The work presented in this thesis would not have been possible without the help and support of far more people than I can recognize in this space. First and foremost I would like to thank my family, especially my parents Lynn and Gene Edens, for all their guidance and continued support over the years. They have provided the foundation on which the person I am has been built. I owe a debt of gratitude to my high school physics teacher, Richard Taylor, for sparking my interest in physics and first setting me down the path that has led me to this point and the faculty of the physics department at Harvey Mudd College for nurturing and refining that interest. I would like to thank my collaborators on the experiments I performed, with special thanks to John Edwards and John Porter, for helping to provide me with the resources and knowledge I needed to complete my research. I would not have made it through graduate school without the help of the coworkers and friends that I have shared an office with for the better part of five years, Gilliss, Greg, and Will, who have unfailingly provided ideas when I've needed inspiration, hands when I've needed help, and friendship when I've needed support. Finally, I would like to thank my advisor, Todd Ditmire, who demonstrated an amazing ability to provide the resources and support necessary for an experiment enabling me to concentrate solely on the science of the experiment. Furthermore, he has been a constant input of energy and inspiration when my motivation was low or it did not seem like my efforts were bearing fruit and has provided knowledge and insight at every turn that has deepened my understanding of the physics I have studied. Supervisor: Todd Ditmire We have performed a series of experiments examining the properties of high Mach number blast waves. Preliminary experiments were conducted on the Janus laser at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory while the majority of experiments were carried out on the Z-Beamlet laser at Sandia National Laboratories. We created blast waves in the laboratory by using 10 J-1000 J laser pulses to illuminate millimeter scale solid targets immersed in gas. The experimental results can be grouped into three categories. Firstly, we confirmed the importance of line radiation on the evolution of the blast wave and that this importance increased with the atomic number of …