  We present an overview of the performance of the Neutralized Drift
Compression Experiment-II (NDCX-II) accelerator at Berkeley Lab, and report on
recent target experiments on beam driven melting and transmission ion energy
loss measurements with nanosecond and millimeter-scale ion beam pulses and thin
tin foils. Bunches with around 10^11 ions, 1-mm radius, and 2-30 ns FWHM
duration have been created with corresponding fluences in the range of 0.1 to
0.7 J/cm^2. To achieve these short pulse durations and mm-scale focal spot
radii, the 1.1 MeV He+ ion beam is neutralized in a drift compression section,
which removes the space charge defocusing effect during final compression and
focusing. The beam space charge and drift compression techniques resemble
necessary beam conditions and manipulations in heavy ion inertial fusion
accelerators. Quantitative comparison of detailed particle-in-cell simulations
with the experiment play an important role in optimizing accelerator
performance.
