Increased Nuclear Fusion Yields of Inertially Confined DT Plasma due to Reheat

The efficiency of energy release has been calculated here for fusion reactions in inertially confined plasmas of high density. It is found that inclusion of reheat due to absorption of the energetic alphas released by the reactions in the plasma itself predicts higher gains G due to ignition. Including losses by bremsstrahlung and fuel depletion we find G = 71 for 1 k J laser energy input with a compression of only 1000 times solid state density.