Wire array Z-pinches are the worlds’ most powerful X-ray sources. When a cylindrical array of thin wires is subjected to a large, fast rising current, the wires heat up and become plasma, the magnetic field created then pulls the plasma to the common axis, with implosion velocities of several hundred kilometers per second.
Upon arrival at the axis, the kinetic energy is transformed to thermal energy resulting in a plasma of very high temperature (~1keV) and density (~1×1020ions/cm3). The X-ray production in such plasmas is enormous, experiments at Sandia National Laboratory produce ~2MJ of X-rays with peak powers of ~290 TW. These X-ray pulses are used to energise hohlraums both for inertial confinement fusion experiments and as a testbed for experiments investigating the opacity of stellar material, the instabiiltiies of exploding supernovae and the equation of state of strongly coupled plasmas.