Harmonic millimeter radiation from a microwave FEL amplifier

Abstract

In this project, an electron beam is bunched at a microwave frequency and the harmonics of this bunching drive radiation at millimeter wavelengths, using a FEL, configured as a single-pass travelling wave amplifier. A 10 kW 24 GHz microwave input signal grows to ∼200 kW level using the lower-frequency unstable root of the waveguide FEL dispersion relation. The Columbia FEL facility operates at this frequency in the TE11 mode, using a helical undulator (1.85 cm period) and a 3 mm diameter 600 kV electron beam contained in a 8.7 mm ID cylindrical waveguide. The harmonic currents set up by the microwave are found to cause growth of harmonic power under two conditions. First, we choose the parameters of the device so that the upper frequency root corresponds to the third harmonic, in which case we observe a small amount of third-harmonic emission in the TE11 mode, accompanied by comparable second harmonic. The millimeter harmonic radiation produced is coherent and phase-related to the microwave source. Second, we have found substantial emission at the seventh harmonic, most likely from the TE72 mode — which, in cylindrical waveguide geometry, travels at very nearly the same wave speed as the 24 GHz TE11 power. In order to excite the seventh-harmonic radiation, the electron beam must be displaced from the system axis — ∼2 mm in this device. The seventh-harmonic output is potentially an attractive choice for a CW FEL which must generate appreciable power at ∼2 mm wavelength for plasma electron cyclotron heating since we can produce this radiation for electron beam energy as low as 400 kV. We present a theoretical model of the experiment which predicts that if the microwave signal is strong enough to drive the FEL into saturation, the harmonic emission becomes powerful.