| Issue |
EPL
Volume 109, Number 2, January 2015
|
|
|---|---|---|
| Article Number | 25001 | |
| Number of page(s) | 5 | |
| Section | Physics of Gases, Plasmas and Electric Discharges | |
| DOI | https://doi.org/10.1209/0295-5075/109/25001 | |
| Published online | 29 January 2015 | |
Plasma density temporal evolution in a high-power microwave pulse compressor switch
Physics Department, Technion - Haifa 32000, Israel
Received: 16 December 2014
Accepted: 6 January 2015
Time-resolved optical-emission spectroscopy measurements are used to evaluate plasma density in an interference switch during the extraction of a nanosecond output pulse from a high-power microwave compressor. The compressor represents a resonant cavity connected to an H-plane waveguide tee with a shorted side arm filled with helium at a pressure of $2\cdot10^{5}\ \text{Pa}$ ; the plasma discharge in the tee side arm is triggered by a Surelite laser. A nanosecond-scale dynamics of the plasma density is obtained by analyzing the shape of the helium spectral lines. The analysis of the experimental data evidences a correlation between the rise time of the plasma density and the peak power of the microwave output pulse. Numerical simulations of the microwave energy release from the cavity with the appearance of the plasma yield results in good agreement with the measured output pulse peak power and waveform.
PACS: 52.80.Pi – High-frequency and RF discharges / 52.70.Kz – Optical (ultraviolet, visible, infrared) measurements / 52.75.Kq – Plasma switches (e.g., spark gaps)
© EPLA, 2015
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