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For the purpose of improving performance and reducing the fabrication difficulty of terahertz traveling wave tubes (TWTs), this paper proposes a novel single-section high-gain slow wave structure (SWS), which is named the symmetrical quasi-synchronous step-transition (SQSST) folded waveguide (FW). The SQSST-FW SWS has an artificially designed quasi-synchronous region (QSR) to suppress self-oscillations for sustaining a high gain in an untruncated circuit. Simultaneously, a symmetrical design can improve the efficiency performance to some extent. A prototype of the SQSST-FW SWS for 650 GHz TWTs is designed based on small-signal analysis and numerical simulation. The simulation results indicate that the maximum saturation gain of the designed 650 GHz SQSST-FW TWT is 39.1 dB in a 34.3 mm slow wave circuit, occurring at the 645 GHz point when a 25.4 kV 15 mA electron beam and a 0.43 mW sinusoidal input signal are applied. In addition, a maximum output power exceeding 4 W is observed at the 648 GHz point using the same beam with an increased input power of around 2.8 mW. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A $Q$ -band traveling-wave tube (TWT) with profiled helix pitches and profiled inner diameters of slow wave structure (SWS) is proposed. The transmission characteristics of the $Q$ -band TWT are simulated by the Computer Simulation Technology (CST). In the operating frequency band (36.5–41.5 GHz), the simulated voltage standing wave ratio (VSWR) is less than 1.5. In addition, the beam–wave interaction is simulated to predict the performance of the $Q$ -band TWT when the beam voltage and beam current are 8.5 kV and 60 mA, respectively, and the axial focusing magnetic field is 0.4 T. In the operating frequency band, the self-oscillation is well suppressed, and the device efficiency of the $Q$ -band TWT exceeds 63.5%, and the saturated output power and gain exceed 83 W and 45 dB, respectively, especially the device efficiency can reach the maximum of 69.5% at 37 GHz. When it is backed off 6 dB from the saturation, the device efficiency exceeds 40.5%, up to 42.7% at 39 GHz. Preliminary experiments have confirmed the design. These results show that the proposed $Q$ -band TWT has important applications to the next generation wireless communication system with high efficiency. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The angular log-periodic meander-line traveling wave tube (TWT) is a kind of low voltage, small-sized, high power, low cost, on chip amplifiers, and considered as a key part of the advanced communication systems, the future biomedical applications and the next electronic counter measure (ECM) instruments et al. Here, an angular log-periodic meander-line TWT is presented in this article. The angular log-periodic meander-line slow wave structure (SWS) is supported by two diamond rods. The dispersion and the impedance characteristics are analyzed in detail. In order to reduce the reflection loss, a gradual ridged waveguide is connecting the input–output standard rectangular waveguide to the meander-line SWS. The particle in cell (PIC) simulations show that the output power of the TWT can reach 55 W at 34 GHz with the operation voltage of 1800 V and the beam current of 0.2 A. The SWS is manufactured by a laser machine with Molybdenum sheet. The assembled TWT is tested and the results show that the ${S}_{{11}}$ is less than −10 dB at 30–39 GHz. The ${S}_{{21}}$ mismatch between the simulated and the measurement is discussed at the end. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A novel electron-optical system (EOS) for ${G}$ -band traveling-wave tubes (TWT) is investigated by simulation and verified by experiment. The EOS includes a sheet beam electron gun, a tunable periodic cusped magnetic focusing (TPCMF), and a collector. An elliptical focus electrode (FE) featuring a simple geometry and easy fabrication is utilized to compress the pencil beam into the sheet beam with a cross section of 0.4 mm $\times0.1$ mm. The electron gun with a cylindrical cathode of 0.8 mm diameter generates the sheet beam with voltage of 22 kV and current of 115 mA. Based on the sheet beam electron gun, the TPCMF with easy assembly and compact size is then proposed. The experimental results show that the beam transmission is 92.1% within a beam tunnel (its length 21.2 mm and cross section 0.8 mm $\times0.15$ mm). The EOS is suitable for ${G}$ -band TWT. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A novel sine groove waveguide slow wave structure (SGW-SWS), originated from the sine waveguide (SW), is proposed for a wideband terahertz (THz) traveling wave tube (TWT). SGW-SWS not only has high interaction impedance in a relatively wide frequency band, but also has a wide beam tunnel. In addition, it can be fabricated using the Nano-Computer Numerical Control (CNC) milling techniques. The high-frequency simulation results show that, under the same dispersion, the passband of SGW-SWS is 23 GHz wider than that of SW-SWS, and the average interaction impedance of SGW-SWS is higher than that of SW-SWS in the whole passband. And the transverse dimension of beam tunnel is independent of the dispersion characteristics of SGW-SWS, so the beam current can be further increased by enlarging the size of beam tunnel. Moreover, the particle-in-cell (PIC) simulation results reveal that the saturated power and electronic efficiency of SGW-TWT in the frequency range of 201–260 GHz are more than 84.9 W and 2.72%, respectively, when the operating voltage is 20.8 kV and the beam current is 150 mA. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this article, a novel dielectric-supported staggered dual-meander-line (DS-SDML) planar slow-wave structure (SWS) is proposed for a traveling wave tube (TWT) working at ${E}$ -band. The proposed staggered arrangement of meander-lines (MLs) leads to a stronger beam–wave interaction and achieves higher output power as compared to the symmetric arrangement. The input–output couplers have been designed by using staggered stepped double ridge waveguide, to connect the standard ${E}$ -band rectangular waveguide and the DS-SDML SWS. An attenuator and pitch tapering have been applied to the proposed SWS to suppress the unwanted frequencies and to improve the output power. Particle-in-cell (PIC) simulation results show that for an 11.8-kV, 200-mA sheet-beam, the output power can reach 283 W at 75 GHz, with a maximum gain and electronic efficiency of 34.5 dB and 11.9%, respectively. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The miniaturized traveling wave tube (TWT) is a kind of high-efficiency, high-power, long-lifetime power amplifier which is an attractive choice for many applications, such as outer space exploration, phased array radar detection, unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) communication, and on-chip application. In this article, a sheet beam miniaturized TWT with V-shaped meander-line slow wave structure (SWS) supported by two trapezoidal ceramic rods is designed. First, the dispersion characteristics, the impedance characteristics, and the S-parameters of the V-shaped meander-line SWS are analyzed in detail. Then, the particle-in-cell (PIC) simulation results predict that the TWT can produce 512-W output power driven by a 7.1 kV, 0.3-A sheet beam with a rectangular cross-sectional area of 3.5 mm $\times0.1$ mm. The TWT can cover the whole ${X}$ -band when the operation voltage shift from 7.1 to 9.1 kV. At last, the V-shaped meander-line SWS is manufactured, assembled, and tested. The good agreement between the simulated and the measured ${S} _{\mathbf {11}}$ has been achieved and the mismatch between the simulated and the measured ${S} _{\mathbf {21}}$ has been discussed at the end. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A novel slow wave structure (SWS), named staggered double corrugated waveguide (SDCW), is proposed for the development of wideband high-power terahertz (THz) traveling wave tubes (TWTs). The SDCW-SWS not only has the wideband characteristic of staggered double grating (SDG) but also has the high interaction impedance characteristic of symmetrical double grating. In addition, its tunnel width is independent of the lower cutoff frequency and can be further increased. Numerical Eigen mode calculations show that, under the same dispersion, the passband of SDCW-SWS is increased by more than 10 GHz compared with SDG-SWS, and the average interaction impedance at 195 GHz is increased by about 62%. A particle-in-cell simulation analysis confirms that the average output power, saturated gain, and electron efficiency of SDCW-TWT at 195 GHz are ~110 W, ~20.34 dB, and ~5.46%, respectively, when the operating voltage is 20 kV and the beam current is 100 mA. Therefore, SDCW is a promising slow wave circuit of wideband high-power THz traveling wave amplifier. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper, a wideband 220-GHz sheet-beam traveling-wave tube (TWT) based on staggered double vane slow-wave structure (SWS) is investigated. A novel method of loading the attenuator into the SWS for suppressing backward wave oscillation is proposed. In addition, a novel focusing electrode of the sheet beam gun is carried out in this paper, which is a whole structure but divided into two parts artificially, one is used to compress the electron beam in $X$ -direction and the other is used to compress the electron beam in $Y$ -direction. In addition, a novel anode is redesigned to reduce the defocusing effect caused by the equipotential surfaces. A nonuniform periodically cusped magnet is used for focusing the sheet electron beam, which is predicted to exhibit 100% beam transmission efficiency in a 75-mm length drift tube. The high-frequency characteristics of the SWS and the beam-wave interaction are also studied. The results reveal that the designed TWT is expected to generate over 78.125-W average power at 214 GHz, and the 3-dB bandwidth is 31.5 GHz, ranging from 203 to 234.5 GHz. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

It is attractive to use sheet beam vacuum devices to generate high frequency, high-power microwave radiation. In this paper, we present the numerical and experimental studies of a high-power Ka-band sheet electron beam backward wave oscillator (BWO), in which the double-grating rectangular waveguide is used as the slow wave structure (SWS) for its thermal and mechanical robustness. The fundamental mode of this kind of SWS is an antisymmetric mode which has an antisymmetric longitudinal field distribution and will nonsynchronously interact with the electron beam on two sides of the electron channel along the vertical direction. We put forward a method to overcome this trouble in this paper. To drive this BWO, a high-power sheet beam is used with a cross section of 30 mm $\times\,$ 1 mm. A thin graphite cathode is used for its superiority in producing a high current, high-quality electron beam. For an experimental electron beam of 141 kV and 1668 A, the output power of over 46.8 MW at 31.68 GHz is obtained, which corresponds to a beam–wave interaction efficiency of 19.9%. Compared with the conventional hollow beam BWO and the single-grating rectangular waveguide sheet beam BWO, the double-grating sheet beam BWOs efficiency is higher, which indicates that the double-grating sheet beam device is promising for producing millimeter wave radiation with high power and high efficiency. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

A phase shift that is caused by the machining errors of independent circuits would greatly affect the efficiency of the power combination in traditional multi-beam structures. In this paper, to reduce the influence of the phase shift and improve the output power, a multi-beam shunted coupling sine waveguide slow wave structure (MBSC-SWG-SWS) has been proposed, and a multi-beam overmoded flat-roofed SWG traveling wave tube (TWT) based on the MBSC-SWG-SWS was designed and analyzed. A TE10-TE30 mode convertor was designed as the input/output coupler in this TWT. The results of the 3D particle-in-cell (PIC) simulation with CST software show that more than a 50 W output power can be produced at 342 GHz, and the 3 dB bandwidth is about 13 GHz. Furthermore, the comparison between the single-beam sine waveguide (SWG) TWT and the multi-beam overmoded SWG TWT indicates that the saturated output power of the multi-beam overmoded SWG TWT is three times more than that of the single beam SWG TWT. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

An attenuator supporting meander-line (ASML) slow wave structure (SWS) is proposed for a Ka-band traveling wave tube (TWT) and studied by simulations and experiments. The ASML SWS simplifies the fabrication and assembly process of traditional planar metal meander-lines (MLs) structures, by employing an attenuator to support the ML on the bottom of the enclosure rather than welding them together on the sides. To reduce the surface roughness of the molybdenum ML caused by laser cutting, the ML is coated by a thin copper film by magnetron sputtering. The measured S11 of the ML is below −20 dB and S21 varies around −8 dB to −12 dB without the attenuator, while below −40 dB with the attenuator. Particle-in-cell (PIC) simulation results show that with a 4.4-kV, 200-mA sheet electron beam, a maximum output power of 126 W is obtained at 38 GHz, corresponding to a gain of 24.1 dB and an electronic efficiency of 14.3%, respectively. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]