Design and Beam Extraction Simulation of a Penning Ion Source for Applying Movable Neutron Generator

Abstract

A penning ion source was designed to apply a movable neutron generator. The magnetic field and discharge current of the ion source were calculated by using the Opera-3D code. As an anode voltage in the ion source increases, the discharge current for hydrogen gas increases and is saturated a 0.0401 A at 6 kV, respectively. The design parameter is suitable for generating and extracting ion beams in the movable neutron generator. In future study, the penning ion source will be fabricated and tested by injecting the hydrogen gas. An optimization will be conducted to search for experimental condition to extract stably the ion beam. This requires easy instrumentation, can be made compact in size, and be operated either in steady state or in pulse mode. The penning ion source which works on the basis of penning discharge was designed and simulated to generate a plasma in a vacuum chamber. A hydrogen gas in the simulation code was injected to test the designed ion source. In this paper, the design parameter and simulation results were discussed