Transmutation prospect of long-lived nuclear waste induced by high-charge electron beam from laser plasma accelerator

TL;DR

This paper demonstrates a novel method for transmuting long-lived nuclear waste using high-charge electron beams from laser plasma accelerators, achieving significantly higher reaction yields than previous approaches.

Contribution

It introduces a new laser-driven electron beam technique for nuclear waste transmutation with enhanced efficiency and applicability to mixed-nuclide waste samples.

Findings

High-charge relativistic e-beam produces intense bremsstrahlung photons.

Transmutation yield of ^{126}Sn is about 10^9 per shot, surpassing previous methods.

Focused laser and plasma conditions can optimize transmutation efficiency.

Abstract

Photo-transmutation of long-lived nuclear waste induced by high-charge relativistic electron beam (e-beam) from laser plasma accelerator is demonstrated. Collimated relativistic e-beam with a high charge of approximately 100 nC is produced from high-intensity laser interaction with near-critical-density (NCD) plasma. Such e-beam impinges on a high-Z convertor and then radiates energetic bremsstrahlung photons with flux approaching 10^{11} per laser shot. Taking long-lived radionuclide ^{126}Sn as an example, the resulting transmutation reaction yield is the order of 10^{9} per laser shot, which is two orders of magnitude higher than obtained from previous studies. It is found that at lower densities, tightly focused laser irradiating relatively longer NCD plasmas can effectively enhance the transmutation efficiency. Furthermore, the photo-transmutation is generalized by considering mixed-nuclide waste samples, which suggests that the laser-accelerated high-charge e-beam could be an efficient tool to transmute long-lived nuclear waste.