Control of gigawatt REB pulse duration using gas injection

A technique for controlling the voltage and current pulse duration of a gigawatt relativistic electron beam (REB) was investigated. The pulse duration of a beam of 250 keV and 10 kA was controlled from 60 ns to 10 ns by injecting gases (air,, argon, and hydrogen) into the diode gap at a pressure ranging from 10^-5 torr to 10^-1. The observed dependence of the pulse duration on the nature and pressure of the gas is explained in terms of volume ionization of the gas by beam electrons. It is concluded that the pulse duration is governed by the time at which the plasma density created by the beam reaches a critical value of the order of beam electron number density