Advances in the understanding of efficient operation of high power backward wave oscillators
- Univ. of New Mexico, Albuquerque, NM (United States). Dept. of Electrical and Computer Engineering
- Sandia National Labs., Albuquerque, NM (United States)
Recent work has shown that the efficiency of converting electron beam energy to microwave energy in a backward wave oscillator (BWO) depends very strongly on reflections within the slow wave structure (SWS), and on the interaction of the electron beam with the forward traveling harmonics. The latter result differs from earlier work where it was indicated that the electron beam cannot interact with forward traveling harmonics. Experiments were performed at UNM using the Sinus-6 relativistic electron beam accelerator and an X-band BWO comprised of uniform amplitude corrugations. Sections of smooth-walled waveguide having different lengths were inserted between the BWO and the upstream cutoff neck. Results from these experiments show that the radiated power and oscillation frequency are periodic functions of the length of the smooth-walled waveguide. Particle-in-cell simulations of the experiments predict similar behavior. Simulations show that the transverse magnetic wave is dominated by fast, backward and forward traveling space harmonics, and the slow, backward traveling harmonic associated with the corrugated structure. These experiments suggest an enhanced frequency agility of high power BWOs by adjusting the phase of reflections within the SWS. A research program is underway to use control strategies to optimize the output of the BWO under investigation and to maximize the bandwidth of operation at moderate (100s of MW) power levels.
- OSTI ID:
- 153826
- Report Number(s):
- CONF-950612-; ISBN 0-7803-2669-5; TRN: IM9602%%344
- Resource Relation:
- Conference: 22. international conference on plasma science, Madison, WI (United States), 5-8 Jun 1995; Other Information: PBD: 1995; Related Information: Is Part Of IEEE conference record -- abstracts: 1995 IEEE international conference on plasma science; PB: 312 p.
- Country of Publication:
- United States
- Language:
- English
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