High-energy-density physics based on HIAF

High-energy-density physics (HEDP) deals with the study of matter under extreme conditions with an energy density higher than 1011 J/m3, corresponding to a pressure of 100 GPa. Such matter exists in abundance in deep interiors of the planets and stars. It also exists for a short duration during nuclear explosion and the loading of high-power-pulsed machines. HEDP is the international frontier of national security, astrophysics and fusion science, and it is also one of the main scientific goals of the high-power laser-facilities, Z-machines and heavy-ion-accelerators. Herein, the HEDP research based on High Intensity heavy-ion Accelerator Facility (HIAF), which is the “12th Five-Year Plan” national major science and technology infrastructure, will be introduced. The HIAF is advocated to provide the world with a heavy-ion beam with utmost high power. The energy and power of one beam pulse is about 100 J and several TW, respectively. With such a high-power heavy-ion beam, heating a solid-state lead sample, for example, could generate homogenous high-energy-density matter with a spatial scale from mm to cm and a temperature of 10 eV, near-solid density, and energy density of 1013 J/m3. Thus, through the HIAF, the generation, properties and evolution of high-energy-density matter can be investigated. This paper also reports the state of the art in the field of HEDP based on HIAF, including the generation and development of high-energy-density matter driven by a high-intensity heavy-ion beam, micro mechanism of interaction between the ion beam and dense matter or plasma, and key diagnostics of the high-energy-density matter driven by a hevy-ion beam.