University of Rochester Laboratory for Laser Energetics

The Laboratory for Laser Energetics (LLE) of the University of Rochester is a unique national resource for research and education in science and technology. LLE was established in The 1970s as a center for the investigation of the interaction of intense radiation with matter, the Laboratory’s mission is to conduct implosion experiments and basic physics experiments in support of the National Inertial Confinement Fusion (ICF) program, to develop new laser and materials technologies, to provide graduate and undergraduate education in electro-optics, high power lasers, high-energy-density physics, plasma physics, and nuclear fusion technology and to conduct research and development in advanced technology related to high energy density phenomena. Precautions were taken and implemented within the design to control movement and any form of vibration that would adversely affect the laboratories sensitive laser equipment. The sketch shown depicts Laboratory for Laser Energetics major research facility, the OMEGA laser system. OMEGA stands 10 meters tall and is approximately 100 meters in length. This system delivers pulses of laser energy to targets in order to measure the resulting nuclear and fluid dynamic events. OMEGA’s 60 laser beams focus up to 40,000 joules of
energy onto a target that measures less than 1 millimeter in diameter in approximately one billionth of a second. At LLE, scientists continue to research what will one day become a vast source of power using the ocean’s ample storehouse of potential energy.