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Electron beams yield high‐power microwaves

NOV 01, 1976

Over the past ten years intense relativistic electron‐beam accelerators (300 kV–10 MV) have been developed that yield 104–106amperes/pulse with pulse durations of tens or hundreds of nanoseconds. With this new tool at hand, experimenters have been trying to convert the electron‐beam energy into microwaves. By reviving the old devices (travelling‐wave tubes and magnetrons) developed a quarter of a century ago and applying the new electron‐beam technology, orders of magnitude higher power have been obtained. For example, very recently George Bekefi and Thaddeus Orzechowski (MIT) have produced microwave bursts in the gigawatt range with a conversion efficiency of electron energy into microwave energy of about 35%.

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This Content Appeared In
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Volume 29, Number 11

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