Design of a high gain and high efficiency W-band folded waveguide TWT using phase-velocity taper

Abstract

The folded-waveguide (FW) slow-wave structure (SWS) is a very promising beam-wave interaction circuit for high-frequency traveling wave tubes (TWTs). This paper presents the design methodology for enhancing the gain and efficiency of a practical W-band FWTWT using phase-velocity taper. Initially, phase-velocity, interaction impedance, and gain-growth of a single-section FWTWT are predicted theoretically. Further, these parameters are optimized using the eigenmode solver and transient solver of 3-D CST Studio. The simulated results agreed with theoretically predicted results within ~1% discrepancy. Then the single-section SWS along with the input and output couplers consisting of quarter-wave impedance transformers and pillbox windows are simulated using transient solver and a return-loss of around −20 dB is obtained over the desired band. Finally, the output power, gain and electronic efficiency for a two-section TWT with the phase-velocity taper are obtained using particle-in-cell simulation of CST Studio. At an applied beam voltage of 20 kV and a current of 0.1 A, an output power of 130 W, corresponding to a saturated gain of 39.4 dB, an instantaneous 3-dB bandwidth of around 5.3%, and electronic efficiency of around 6.5% at 94 GHz has been obtained. It was found that at 94 GHz the ‘positively and negatively phase-velocity tapered’ sections enhanced the gain by almost 3 dB and doubles the electronic efficiency of the two-section FWTWT design as compared to the two-section FWSWS with the same interaction circuit length with no phase-velocity taper.