Studies of Pulse Shortening Phenomena and Their Effects on the Beam-Wave Interaction in an RBWO Operating at Low Magnetic Field

Abstract

Particle-in-cell (PIC) simulations using the MAGIC-3D code are performed to illustrate the beam-wave interaction behavior and the effects of pulse shortening in relativistic backward wave oscillator (RBWO) operating at a low guiding magnetic field. The causes of pulse-shortening phenomena such as beam degradation, high RF electric field breakdown, and collector plasma formation are studied in simulations. The PIC simulations of the RBWO operating at a low guiding magnetic field 0.61 T including all the effects of pulse shortening predicted that an RF output power 0.70 GW with operating frequency 9.5 GHz and the power conversion efficiency 21.3% will be shortened after 63 ns of simulation time. © 2020 IEEE.