This volume contains articles on efficient generation of second-harmonic radiation from short-pulse lasers; calculation of the stabilization cutoff wave numbers for the Rayleigh-Taylor instability; a high-frequency silicon optical modulator; the angular dependence of stimulated Brillouin scattering; and femtosecond dynamics of ladder polymers. Three of these articles--second-harmonic generation, Rayleigh-Taylor cutoff wave numbers, and angular dependence of Brillouin scattering--are directly related to the OMEGA Upgrade, currently under construction. A summary of the status of the OMEGA Upgrade laser facility and the NLUF News for FY94 are included in this volume.

This volume of the LLE review, covering the period of October--December 1994, contains articles on a diagnostic method employing krypton spectroscopy for measurement of temperature and shell-fuel mixing in high-temperature implosions; the first direct assessment of the ion-acoustic decay instability in a large-scale length, hot plasma; measurements of polarization mode dispersion and group-velocity walkaway in birefringent media using a frequency domain interferometer; an evaluation of the magnetic flux dynamics occurring in an optically triggered, thin-film superconducting switch; the effect of slurry fluid chemistry on particle size distribution during aqueous polishing of optical glass; and the influence of thermal and mechanical processing history in the preparation of well-ordered liquid crystal elastomer systems.