A fast single particle Monte-Carlo method of computing the breakdown threshold of multipactor in microwave device

Abstract

To compute the breakdown thresholds of multipactor in microwave devices, a fast single particle Monte-Carlo (SP-MC) method is presented, which considers the random nature of secondary electrons and their initial energies, phases and angles. With Runge-Kutta method and Furman model, the motion of the electron and the secondary electron yield (SEY) of the wall of the device are computed. An effective SEY is regarded as a criterion to estimate whether multipactor occurs, which is computed by averaging the SEYs for all impacts. As an example, the multipactor in a transmission line composed of parallel plates is investigated with the presented SP-MC method, traditional Monte-Carlo method, statistical theory method and particle-in-cell method separately. The results obtained from the SP-MC method accord well with those from the statistical theory method and particle-in-cell method, including the results of the susceptibility zones, break thresholds on specific products of frequency and gap space. Moreover, the SP-MC method is more adaptive than the statistical theory method, more stable than the traditional Monte-Carlo method and much more efficient than the particle-in-cell method.