Design of electron-beam controlled switches

This paper reviews the principles of operation of the electron-beam controlled switch (EBCS) and presents a procedure for its design. The EBCS is compared to other switches which have potential application to repetitively pulsed, high power systems, and is found to have some substantial advantages at high (greater than approximately 10 kHZ) repetition rates. Circuit requirements for the application of an EBCS to ETA/ATA like devices are outlined. A self-consistent formalism for optimum switch design is derived. The formalism is applied to the previously outlined circuit requirements using capacitive and capacitive-inductive hybrid energy storage schemes. The required switches are readily designed.