Magnetic field influence on the Penning discharge characteristics

Abstract

Abstract In this work characteristics of pulsed penning ion source for miniature linear accelerators was investigated by experimental measurements and PIC (Particle-In-Cell) simulations. The paper presents dependences of the discharge current and extracted current on intensities of the uniform magnetic field for different pressure. Also, typical examples of the current pulse waveforms obtained by PIC simulation and experiment for different magnetic field are presented. The simulated electron and ion distributions inside discharge gap give qualitative explanation of the experimentally observed fluctuations in current pulses. These current fluctuations arise as a result of the violation of the electric field axial symmetry due to the electron spoke movement of the towards the anode.