Behavior of a Spark Gap Pulser at High Repetition Rate

Abstract

Operation of a unique pulser system using a miniaturized spark gap geometry is described in this article. The important features of the pulser system are its high power handling capability accompanied by ultrashort pulses with pulsewidths of a few nanoseconds (ns), rise times of a few hundred picoseconds (ps) and very high pulse repetition rates (PRR) exceeding 1 MHz. Although the gaseous breakdown at large gap sizes has long been well established, the breakdown in microgaps has still not been suciently explored. The switching action of a spark gap employing discharges in microgaps or microplasma discharges, unlike commonly used high-voltage and high-current spark gap discharges, has been explored for high repetition rates. Considerable attention has been focused on important properties of and insights into the discharge channel gap, the voltage recovery process and the post spark discharge period for stable and ecient performance of the pulser system. In parallel, a theoretical analysis has been carried out using a PSpice simulation for optimization of several circuit parameters to drive the pulser system. Theoretical calculations of the system eciency and PRR are thoroughly studied and presented through this simulation.