Dispersion Analysis in Broadband Helix Traveling-wave Tube

Daniel T. Lopes1 and Claudio C. Motta2

1
PATRIA Foundation
Ipero, SP, Brazil, 18560-000
2
University of Sao Paulo
Sao Paulo, SP, Brazil, 055800-000

Abstract: This paper focus on an issue that vacuum
electronics engineers face while designing wide band
slow-wave structures for traveling wave tubes: The
obtaining of reasonably flat gain curve over the
bandwidth. It is usual to try a tradeoff between
synchronism and interaction impedance profile in order
to achieve a better gain response. We show here results
from an in house one-dimensional large signal code,
which indicates that when a large variation in the
electrical length of the circuit takes place (e.g. very wide
band circuits) dispersion control has little effect on the
gain profile.
Keywords: traveling-wave tube, slow-wave structure,
helix, broad-band, multi-octave circuit.
Introduction
Multi-octave helix traveling-wave tubes (TWT) are
vacuum electronic device capable of amplifying
microwave over more than one octave. They find
application mainly in electronic countermeasure systems.
They can also replace two or more TWTs of smaller
bandwidth in order to simplify a system in terms of
complexity, number of parts, reliability and efficiency.
Even though a helix provides the broader band of all
known slow-wave structures, dispersion control
techniques must be applied to ensure multi-octave
synchronism between the electron beam and the wave
traveling down the tube.
A widespread technique for dispersion control consists in
constructing vanes around the helix between support rods
[1]. For a given helix slow-wave structure, the phase
velocity is greater at lower frequencies. Bringing the outer
metallic barrel closer to the helix makes dispersion
reduced. However, that benefit comes at expense of a
sensible reduction in the interaction impedance.
Metallic vanes are known to mimic in some degree an
axially conducting outer barrel that was brought closer to
the helix. This technique provides a greater control over
dispersion with less degradation in the interaction
impedance.
With the help of 3D eigensolvers it is possible to design
fairly complex vanes structures and dispersion can be
controlled.
The TWT gain is proportional to both the interaction
impedance and the synchronism level between e-beam
and the forward wave. However, the gain depends
differently on those. While gain is highly dependent on
the synchronism with the slow-space charge wave, it is
also proportional to the cubic root of the interaction
impedance. Therefore, this works deals with the problem
of finding an estimated value for the amount of dispersion
that would balance the extra amount of interaction
impedance in the lower frequencies, producing a flatter
gain response.
Analysis
Figure 1 illustrates the problem. The slow wave structure
presents positive dispersion characteristic, i.e., phase
velocity increasing with frequency. It is adjusted so that
good synchronism is achieved in the upper band where
impedance is low. In the lower band, where the
impedance is high, the synchronism is poor.
There is yet another factor that contributes to this
problem. In the Pierce gain formula [2],
= + [ ] (1)
the gain factor C is multiplied by the tube distance in
wavelengths N. This factor multiplies directly the gain
factor C, while the dependence to the interaction
impedance goes with a cubic root factor (C3 = K0I0/4V0).
A large signal one-dimensional code [3] was used to
obtain the gain for a set of 4 vane configuration for a
single section of traveling-wave tube circuit. Each vane
configuration implements a different level of synchronism
at the lower band while maintaining a roughly the same
level of synchronism at upper band edge. The cold model
parameters, i.e., phase velocity and interaction impedance
are shown in Figure 2. The beam DC normalized velocity
is about 0.190.
Figure 1. A positive dispersion slow-wave structure with
its high frequency phase velocity synchronous to the slow
space-charge wave.
Figure 2. Phase velocity and interaction impedance for 4
configurations of vane structures, each one providing a
different level of dispersion.
The circuit cold model parameters were loaded into the
large signal code and simulations were run for several
frequencies from 2 to 12 GHz. The results are shown in
Figure 3.
Results
Even though the maximum phase velocity variation along
the band is around 2%, for vane configuration #4, the gain
variation is more than 20 dB from 2 to 8 GHz.
Additionally, the lower band edge, where the vanes
configurations present the most different phase velocity,
is where the gain varies the least. Appreciable variation in
gain is observed in the upper band, where the gain is
greater. Despite of the variation in dispersion profile, all
vane configurations presented the same pattern of gain vs
frequency. In the lower band, where fewer wavelength
travel through the circuit, the bunching process occurs
less times than in the upper band where multiple times
more wavelengths travel through the circuit experiencing,
in turn, more bunching. At the upper band, the greatly
increased number of wavelengths suffering the bunching
process, even at lower impedance, is much more effective
than in the lower band, in which much fewer wavelengths
experience bunching at higher impedance.
Figure 3. Gain as a function of frequency for the four vane
configurations producing the different dispersion profiles
observed in Figure 2.
Conclusion
In this paper we presented another view based on large
signal simulation of the dispersion characteristics of a
multi-octave slow wave circuit for traveling-wave tubes.
It was found that multi-octave circuits will naturally
present large variation in gain inside the band, since the
large variation in number of wavelengths to suffer bunch
process overcomes the effect of phase velocity and
interaction impedance tailoring. The use of gain
equalizers in the TWT input is the best way to mitigate
this problem as it has been seen in many wide band TWT.
Acknowledgements
The authors thank CNPq for its financial support
throughout this project under process 384823/2014-9 and
FINEP under contract 01.13.0335.00.
References
1. A. S. Gilmour, Klystrons, Traveling Wave Tubes,
Magnetrons, Crossed-Field Ampliers, and
Gyrotrons. Artech House, 2011.
2. J. R. Pierce, Traveling Wave Tubes. New York:
Van Nostrand, 1950.
3. D. T. Lopes, C. C. Motta, “1D large signal time
domain code for TWT,” IEEE PPC 2011, Chicago,
2011.