THEORETICAL AND EXPERIMENTAL INVESTIGATION OF A METHOD FOR INCREASINGTHE OUTPUT POWER OF A MICROWAVE TUBE BASED ON THE SPLIT-CAVITY OSCILLATOR

The split-cavity oscillator (SCO) is a cavity resonator that can be us ed to produce a high degree of density modulation in an intense relati vistic electron beam. The kinetic energy of electrons in the modulated beam can be converted into high-power microwaves. Aspects of the modu lated beam that affect the process of converting beam power into micro wave power are considered, and a technique is investigated for optimiz ing the conversion efficiency of a microwave tube based on the SCO. Us ing a combination of nonlinear theory, numerical simulation, and exper iment, it is shown that the most efficient implementation of the SCO i s as the modulating component of a klystronlike tube, in which the mod ulated beam is drifted a relatively short distance to maximize the rf current, which optimizes the efficiency of power extraction.