The ablator “packages” are thin, planar sandwiches of actual ablator material surrounding a very thin layer of a spectroscopic tracer
halfraum radiation
Ge-doped or undoped plastic
NaCl tracer
< 0.5 m
~20 m
~5 m
This package, mounted over a hole on the outside of the hohlraum, actually sees a time-dependent radiation field (the “drive”) that is very similar to what’s seen by a spheric capsule in the center of a hohlraum.
When we see the spectroscopic signature of the chlorine in the tracer, we know the radiation wave has reached it.