TY - JOUR
T1 - Frequency and bandwidth agile pulser for use in wideband applications
AU - Tyo, J. Scott
AU - Skipper, Michael C.
AU - Abdalla, Michael D.
AU - Romero, Samuel P.
AU - Cockreham, Brett
N1 - Funding Information:
Manuscript received January 5, 2004; revised February 27, 2004. This work was supported by the Air Force Office of Scientific Research (AFOSR) under the DEPSCoR Program and in part by the Compact Portable Pulsed Power MURI. J. S. Tyo is with the Electrical Engineering and Computer Engineering Department, University of New Mexico, Albuquerque, NM 87131 USA (e-mail: [email protected]). M. C. Skipper, M. D. Abdalla, and S. P. Romero are with ASR Corporation, Albuquerque, NM 87120 USA (e-mail: [email protected]; mda@ asrcorporation.com; [email protected]). B. Cockreham is with Solid Design, Inc., Albuquerque, NM 87109 USA (e-mail: [email protected]). Digital Object Identifier 10.1109/TPS.2004.835486 Fig. 1. The general experimental topology is to have a parallel plate Blumlein with the movable center electrode pulse charged. The output is a parallel plate Blumlein with a testing volume and a terminating load.
PY - 2004/10
Y1 - 2004/10
N2 - We have developed an architecture to produce a wideband pulser that is tunable in the important parameters of pulsewidth, bandwidth, and center frequency. The pulser is based on a parallel plate Blumlein pulse-forming network (PFN) with a movable center (charge) conductor. When the center conductor is displaced from the ideal Blumlein position, the balance in the PFN is lost, resulting in a slightly ringing waveform that can be tuned. By selecting the amount of ringing, the output bandwidth of the PFN can be adjusted. Furthermore, by simply sliding the center conductor out of the PFN, the effective electrical length can be adjusted, allowing the fundamental period of the ringing waveform to be altered, thereby changing the center frequency of the output waveform. Our pulser is designed to operate in the range of 300 MHz to 2 GHz, but the architecture is scalable outside this range. In this paper, we present design and simulation results, low-voltage tests, and preliminary high-voltage (15-kV) data that is obtained with a pressurized gas trigatron designed specifically for this test fixture. The pulser is being designed for laboratory use in testing the effects of interaction of high-intensity wideband electromagnetic fields with small-scale electrical and biological systems.
AB - We have developed an architecture to produce a wideband pulser that is tunable in the important parameters of pulsewidth, bandwidth, and center frequency. The pulser is based on a parallel plate Blumlein pulse-forming network (PFN) with a movable center (charge) conductor. When the center conductor is displaced from the ideal Blumlein position, the balance in the PFN is lost, resulting in a slightly ringing waveform that can be tuned. By selecting the amount of ringing, the output bandwidth of the PFN can be adjusted. Furthermore, by simply sliding the center conductor out of the PFN, the effective electrical length can be adjusted, allowing the fundamental period of the ringing waveform to be altered, thereby changing the center frequency of the output waveform. Our pulser is designed to operate in the range of 300 MHz to 2 GHz, but the architecture is scalable outside this range. In this paper, we present design and simulation results, low-voltage tests, and preliminary high-voltage (15-kV) data that is obtained with a pressurized gas trigatron designed specifically for this test fixture. The pulser is being designed for laboratory use in testing the effects of interaction of high-intensity wideband electromagnetic fields with small-scale electrical and biological systems.
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=8144224943&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.1109/TPS.2004.835486
DO - 10.1109/TPS.2004.835486
M3 - Article
AN - SCOPUS:8144224943
SN - 0093-3813
VL - 32
SP - 1925
EP - 1931
JO - IEEE Transactions on Plasma Science
JF - IEEE Transactions on Plasma Science
IS - 5 I
ER -