THE GAS-PUFF Z-PINCH IS AN INTENSE NEUTRON AND X-RAY SOURCE WITH WIDE RANGING APPLICATIONS INCLUDING RADIATION PHYSICS, THERMONUCLEAR FUSION, MATERIALS SCIENCE, AND DIAGNOSTICS. HOWEVER, TWO ASPECTS OF Z-PINCHES, NAMELY THE ONSET OF INSTABILITIES AND THERMAL CONDUCTION LOSSES, REQUIRE BETTER UNDERSTANDING TO ADVANCE THEIR APPLICATIONS. THE TWO MAIN GOALS OF THIS PROJECT ARE RELATED TO THESE ISSUES. THE FIRST OBJECTIVE IS TO IMPROVE ON DEMONSTRATED INSTABILITY MITIGATION TECHNIQUES, BY COMBINING TWO SUCCESSFUL APPROACHES – NAMELY, SNOWPLOW STABILIZATION BY TAILORING THE GAS DENSITY PROFILE, AND AXIAL MAGNETIC FIELDS. DESPITE THE SUCCESSFUL DEMONSTRATION OF THESE TECHNIQUES INDIVIDUALLY, THERE IS YET TO BE A SYSTEMATIC STUDY IN WHICH THESE APPROACHES ARE COMBINED IN A SYSTEMATIC WAY. MAGNETOHYDRODYNAMIC SIMULATIONS PREDICT THAT A COMBINED APPROACH USING A TRIPLE GAS PUFF WITH TWO GAS LINERS AND A CENTRAL JET ALLOWS FOR THE LOAD TO BE COMPRESSED TO HIGHER DENSITIES AND TEMPERATURES, RESULTING IN BETTER PERFORMANCE. THE SECOND GOAL IS TO IMPROVE UNDERSTANDING OF HEAT TRANSFER BETWEEN SPECIES OF A MULTI-SHELL GAS-PUFF IMPLOSION. THERMAL CONDUCTION IS THE DOMINANT HEAT LOSS MECHANISM IN THE ~1 MA CURRENT REGIME, AND MITIGATION OF SUCH LOSSES IS CRITICAL FOR REACHING HIGH ENERGY DENSITY. SIMULATIONS PREDICT THAT ELECTRON LOSSES CAN BE MITIGATED VIA MAGNETIC INSULATION, AND ION LOSSES CAN BE MITIGATED VIA REDUCTION OF ¿TI, WHEN A MAGNETIZED TRIPLE GAS-PUFF LOAD CONFIGURATION IS USED. SUCCESSFUL DEMONSTRATION OF THESE EFFECTS WOULD HAVE SIGNIFICANT IMPLICATIONS FOR THE APPLICATION OF THE TRIPLE GAS-PUFF Z-PINCH AS A NEUTRON AND/OR X-RAY SOURCE. THE PROPOSED EXPERIMENTS WILL STUDY THE EFFECT OF AXIAL PRE-MAGNETIZATION AND DIFFERENT GAS SPECIES ON IMPLOSION DYNAMICS AND MRTI MITIGATION, MAGNETIC FIELD DISTRIBUTION DURING THE IMPLOSION, AND STAGNATION CONDITIONS IN A TRIPLE GAS PUFF Z-PINCH. EXPERIMENTS WILL BE CONDUCTED ON THE CESZAR DRIVER (CURRENT 0.5-0.7 MA, CURRENT RISE TIME ~160 NS) AT UC SAN DIEGO. THE USE OF ADVANCED DIAGNOSTIC TECHNIQUES, WILL PROVIDE PHYSICAL INSIGHT BASED ON TIME-AND/OR SPATIALLY-RESOLVED DATA. THIS RESEARCH PROJECT WILL ALSO CONTRIBUTE TO THE TRAINING OF THE NEXT GENERATION WORKFORCE IN THE FIELD OF PULSED POWER TECHNOLOGY, PLASMA DIAGNOSTICS, AND NUMERICAL ANALYSIS.