A “crab-like” A6 relativistic magnetron with diffraction output driven by a transparent cathode

• Published in: Physics of plasmas 2019-01, Vol.26 (1)
• Main Authors: Liu, M., Schamiloglu, E., Fuks, M. I., Liu, C., Jiang, W., Feng, J.
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Subjects: Cathodes; Crabs; Diffraction; Electric potential; Magnetic fields; Narrowband; Particle in cell technique; Plasma; Plasma physics; Relativism; Relativistic effects; Spokes; Superhigh frequencies; Switching
• ISSN: 1070-664X; 1089-7674
• DOI: 10.1063/1.5079761

We present the design of an A6 relativistic magnetron with diffraction output (MDO) which looks like a crab and we named it the “crab-like” A6 MDO. This article shows that the crab-like A6 MDO driven by a transparent cathode can radiate the TE11 mode with an output power of about 1 GW when an optimized applied voltage of U = 440 kV and magnetic field of B = 0.43  T are used. Its electronic efficiency, as obtained using UNIPIC particle-in-cell (PIC) simulations, can be as high as 44% in S-band. The UNIPIC PIC code used in simulations also demonstrates that the crab-like A6 MDO can radiate both two electron spokes in the TE21 mode with an operating frequency of 2.1 GHz and four electron spokes in the TE21 mode with an operating frequency of 2.5 GHz when different magnetic field amplitudes are used for an applied voltage of U = 400  kV. This result suggests that this configuration is favorable for mode switching. This work seeks to design a compact high power microwave source for a narrowband directed microwave wave beam that is suitable for mode switching investigations.