  Two different methods have been employed to determine the plasma temperature
in a laser-cluster fusion experiment on the Texas Petawatt laser. In the first,
the temperature was derived from time-of-flight data of deuterium ions ejected
from exploding D2 or CD4 clusters. In the second, the temperature was measured
from the ratio of the rates of two different nuclear fusion reactions occurring
in the plasma at the same time: D(d, 3He)n and 3He(d, p)4He. The temperatures
determined by these two methods agree well, which indicates that: i) The ion
energy distribution is not significantly distorted when ions travel in the
disassembling plasma; ii) The kinetic energy of deuterium ions, especially the
hottest part responsible for nuclear fusion, is well described by a
near-Maxwellian distribution.
