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Spoof plasmon is surface waves extended along corrugated surfaces and the terahertz equivalent of optical surface plasmon polaritons for metals. The spoof plasmon may be effectively excited by an electron beam. The beam is perturbed three-dimensionally during the interaction with the spoof plasmon. In this work, we present numerical analysis on the spoof-plasmon instability driven by a magnetized electron beam in a terahertz region. The slow cyclotron as well as Cherenkov instabilities of the spoof plasmon are excited due to the 3-D perturbation. The two instabilities grow large and merge by increasing the beam current and decreasing the magnetic field. The merged instability divides again into the two instabilities for an extremely high beam current. The spoof-plasmon instabilities are examined by revealing modes involved using the saddle-point analysis. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A surface-wave oscillator (SWO) is one of the promising terahertz-wave sources based on excitation of a surface wave using an electron beam. The surface wave is formed by a metal periodic structure, and the frequency is determined by the size parameter of the structure and the parameters of the electron beam. In this article, we design and fabricate a 200-GHz cylindrical corrugated waveguide which has the periodic structure on the inner wall. The field intensity of the surface wave rapidly decreases to zero from the structured wall. Due to a manufacturing error of the corrugated waveguide, the frequency of the surface wave in the fabricated structure decreases to 189 GHz at $\pi $ -point in comparison with the frequency of 204 GHz in the designed one. The effect of the error is evaluated by calculating the intensity distribution of the electric field of the surface wave and its growth rate due to the beam interaction. We also conduct the SWO experiment using the fabricated waveguide. Intense radiation with a total power is roughly estimated to 0.2 kW with a 45-keV and 60-A electron beam. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We numerically and experimentally studied the operation of a W-band (75–110 GHz) surface-wave oscillator driven by the electron beam energy of less than 100 keV. Two numerical methods of the real wavenumber analysis and the saddle point analysis are studied to examine the operation of the oscillator. We analyzed the Cherenkov instability for the interaction of the space charge modes and the structure modes EH01. We showed that the instabilities are of absolute instabilities when the oscillator operates around the $\pi $ -point region. In the experiment, radiations due to the absolute instability are detected around the $\pi $ -point region when the length of the slow-wave structure (SWS) is short enough. On the other hand, the absolute instability generates no meaningful radiation in the $\pi $ -point region for the long length of SWS. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Beam interactions with surface waves and higher order modes in oversized $G$ -band slow-wave structures (SWSs) are studied in a coaxial SWS. The coaxial SWS reduces the number of higher order mode and eases the mode competition problem. The SWS is excited by an annular electron beam. The slow cyclotron (SC) interaction as well as the Cherenkov interaction occurs due to 3-D beam perturbations of the electron beam. Growth rates for the surface waves are larger than those for the higher order modes and increase with increasing beam current. The SC interaction merges with the Cherenkov interaction for a sufficiently high beam current and a relatively low magnetic field. And the merged growth rate also increases with the beam current. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

We have studied an atmospheric-pressure plasma generated using a quartz tube, helium gas, and a copper foil electrode by the application of a radio-frequency high voltage. The atmospheric-pressure plasma, which is generated in the form of a bullet, is released as a plume into the atmosphere. To study the properties of plasma plume formation, we examine the relationships among the plasma plume length and charge and the applied voltage waveform. The dependences of the waveform on the plasma plume length and charge are not clear. However, the plasma plume length increases with increasing plasma plume charge in laminar flow. Consequently, we find that the plasma plume length depends on the plasma plume charge becoming an energy source so that electric charge travels the plasma. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

An oversized $G$ -band backward wave oscillator (BWO) driven by a weakly relativistic electron beam less than 100 kV is studied. Rectangular corrugations are used as the slow-wave structure (SWS), which have surface waves with upper cutoff frequencies of above 150 GHz [ $G$ -band (140–220 GHz)]. In this paper, we examine the starting conditions for intense $G$ -band BWO operation by varying the beam parameters and SWS lengths. It is shown that a starting energy exists for the $G$ -band BWO and that the starting energy is more critical than the starting current in the oversized BWO. Above the starting energy, very intense output powers on the order of 10 kW are obtained. The oscillation-starting condition for such intense operation may play an important role in high-intensity terahertz wave sources. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

In this paper, the electromagnetic properties of a beam free trapezoidally corrugated slow wave structure (TCSWS) are numerically and experimentally investigated. The dimensions of the TCSWS are selected so that it can be deployed in $X$ -band backward wave oscillators (BWOs). The theoretical dispersion characteristics for the axisymmetric TM01\--TM03 modes are obtained by solving the dispersion equation numerically. In order to verify the numerical calculation, a cold test is conducted using a 6-period TCSWS cavity and a vector network analyzer (VNA). The cavity is excited by a small needle-type antenna and frequency of the VNA is swept over the passbands. The dispersion characteristics are obtained from frequency values of the discrete resonant peaks of reflection measurement of each TM mode. Experimental results show an excellent agreement with numerical ones. The numerical and cold test results reveal that TCSWS can be used as an alternative to sinusoidally corrugated slow wave structure in BWO experiments with an advantage of ease of fabrication. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Electron beam generation in a weakly relativistic region of less than 100 kV is investigated utilizing rectangular and disk cold cathodes made of copper. Electron emission areas are located on the edges of the cathodes. For uniform electron emission, some surface roughness is required on the emission surface, which is obtained by scratching the surface with sandpaper. A uniform sheet beam with a size of about 2\,\times\,40 mm and an annular beam with a diameter of about 25 mm and a thickness of about 2 mm are demonstrated in the weakly relativistic region. Stable electron beams of sheet and annular shapes are experimentally demonstrated. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Normal modes and slow-wave instabilities in an oversized coaxial slow-wave structure (SWS) are numerically analyzed for the case of a weakly relativistic annular beam. The coaxial SWS has outer and inner rectangular corrugations with K-band dimensions. The inner corrugations have a cylindrical surface wave, which is the fundamental mode and exists even if the outer conductor is removed. The outer corrugations generate higher-order waveguide modes. Both transverse and longitudinal beam perturbations are considered in the beam interactions, leading to slow cyclotron instabilities as well as Cherenkov instabilities. The instabilities of axisymmetric and nonaxisymmetric modes have almost the same growth rates. The relative position between the outer and inner corrugations affects the normal modes and may allow wide frequency tunability. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The temporal growth rate (TGR) in a trapezoidally corrugated slow-wave structure for a backward-wave oscillator is theoretically studied. An intense relativistic annular electron is used as the energy source for the device. The annular electron beam is assumed to be infinitesimally thin in the radial extent and guided by an infinitely strong magnetic field. The trapezoidal profile of the structure is approximated by a sinusoidal function using Fourier approximation, and the dispersion relation of the system is derived using the Rayleigh–Fourier method. To study the TGR of the electromagnetic wave inside the system, the dispersion equation is solved for different values of the beam parameters. The dimensions of sinusoidally corrugated comparable trapezoidal structure are determined by comparing their dispersion characteristics. For the TM01 mode, TGR of instability that gives a qualitative measure of the microwave generation is calculated. The peak TGR of the proposed structure is found to be on average 1.5% higher than that of the sinusoidally corrugated slow-wave structure for the same set of beam parameters. Apart from its improved growth rate, the proposed structure has an added advantage of easy fabrication. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]