Analysis on circuit-elements-composed-simulator of vircator for electromagnetic pulse emission

Abstract

Vircator (Virtual Cathode Oscillator), which is one of the microwave sources, has been stuided widely for more than 20 years since it has such advantages as simple structure and high power radiation 1. As electromagnetic pulse (EMP) emitted by vircator has been developing, the studies about hazard of the EMP on target have been also increasing 2. In these applications it is difficult to build the whole system for EMP protection, because it is costly, dangerous and complex. For this reason, the vircator simulator to be composed circuit elements (R, L, C and etc.) is strongly needed. Numerically, vircator can be analyzed by PIC (Particle In Cell). However it takes too many times in computation. Therefore, the purpose of this paper is to build a vircator simulator via circuit elements, which could have its equivalent behavior with lower computation. In this paper, passive elements and switch are used to model for space-charge limitation, absorptions, oscillation and etc. The number of oscillation between the anode and the virtual cathode is limited. These circuit analysis is simulated by EMTP (Electro Magnetic Transient Program). Through the circuit-elements-composed-simulator, it can be handled with as the whole system for EMP protection. This means that circuit analysis can be carried out from the prime power to vircator. It is expected to help the improvement of EMP system with vircator efficiently.