Late-time breakup of laser-driven hydrodynamics experiments

Laser-driven blast waves are frequently used to explore hydrodynamic instability at high energy density. Experiments are designed such that the instability physics occurs in isolation, but secondary processes will eventually develop within the experimental system and affect the physics. At late times, as the blast wave diminishes in strength, these processes increasingly dominate while the instability physics weakens. The resulting dynamics can appear turbulent, and the root cause is not immediately apparent. In this work, we examine the conditions under which a system can begin to exhibit such behavior and, in this context, consider data from an experiment exploring Rayleigh-Taylor hydrodynamic instability, showing significant turbulent-like structure in the material mixing region.