Passive freeze-out of the Richtmyer-Meshkov instability
Abstract
The Richtmyer-Meshkov instability (RMI) poses a major challenge in inertial confinement fusion (ICF) due to its role in mixing and performance degradation. We report the first experimental observation of passive freeze-out of RMI in a low-pressure surrogate regime; an instability stagnation effect induced without modifying the driving pressure pulse or the target surface geometry. Using additively manufactured sub-surface voids in a sinusoidal target, we convert a single shock into a sequence of weaker shocks that suppress instability growth upstream of the surface by over 70%. High-speed X-ray imaging and hydrodynamic simulations suggest that this suppression arises primarily from temporal shaping, with lesser contributions from spatial curvature and shock weakening. Our results demonstrate a driver-independent pathway for controlling shock-driven hydrodynamic instabilities relevant to ICF and other high energy density systems.
Keywords
Cite
@article{arxiv.2602.21375,
title = {Passive freeze-out of the Richtmyer-Meshkov instability},
author = {J. Strucka and D. M. Sterbentz and B. Lukic and K. Mughal and Y. Yao and K. Marrow and W. J. Schill and C. F. Jekel and D. A. White and N. Asmedianov and R. Grikshtas and O. Belozerov and S. Efimov and J. Skidmore and A. Rack and Ya. E. Krasik and J. L. Belof and J. P. Chittenden and S. N. Bland},
journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:2602.21375},
year = {2026}
}