What is the difference between laser beams and ion beams, especially in inertial confinement fusion?
In inertial fusion, we use lasers as well as ion beams for driving the reaction. What is the difference?
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An ion beam is a stream of ionized particles, meaning that they are more reactive, either have too many or too few electrons.
A laser beam is a stream of photons, of coherent light.
What both have in common though is the fact that they transport energy (in different ways though).