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At least 145 records · Page 8
All sourcesNASA NTRSDOE OSTI
DOE OSTI2019

RF beam scattering by cylindrical filaments and interfacial density fluctuations

Radio Frequency (RF) waves are routinely used in tokamaks for heating, current drive, NTM control, as well as for diagnostics purposes. Frequently, RF waves, aiming towards the plasma core, propagate through a turbulent environment. The latter can exhibit strong coherent density fluctuations as well as filamentary structures mainly (though, not perfectly) aligned along the local magnetic field lines. The scattering process of RF waves by these structures is studied both analytically and numerically. RF waves can be either single plane waves or spatially confined beams. For that purpose, the filaments are considered to have cylindrical shape with infinite length with the cylinder axis not aligned with the local magnetic field and the results are compared to the ones from the study of the aligned case. On the other hand, the interfacial density fluctuations are considered periodic with spatial periods larger, smaller or of the same order of the wavelength of the incident RF waves. The frequency range of the RF waves studied is mainly in the Electron Cyclotron (EC) range of frequencies for ITER-like and Medium Size Tokamak applications. Furthermore, the study covers a variety of density contrasts, filament sizes and fluctuation strengths.

70 PLASMA PHYSICS AND FUSION TECHNOLOGY↗
NASA NTRS1981

The integrated optic RF spectrum analyzer

The results of measurements made on a fully integrated optic RF spectrum analyzer (IOSA) are reported. The performance of the device acousto-optic bandwidth, single-tone RF resolution, two-tone RF resolution, single-tone dynamic range, two-tone dynamic range, and single-tone RF response are presented. The device parameters that control device performance are analyzed. These results demonstrate the viability of the IOSA for real time spectrum analysis of pulsed and CW RF signals. Improvements of RF bandwidth resolution can be obtained by the use of larger collimated optical beams which requires larger optical lens elements, and hence, larger crystals.

Pedinoff, M. E.↗
DOE OSTI2013

Development Of A Compact Photo-injector With RF-focusing Lens For Short Pulse Electron Source Application

For development of compact ultrafast electron source system, we are currently designing a short-pulse RF-gun with RF focusing structure by means of a series of comprehensive modeling analysis processes. EM design of a 2.5 cell resonant cavity with input coupler, acceleration dynamics of photo-emitted electron bunch, EM design of RF-lens with input coupler, and phasespace analysis of focused electron bunch are systematically examined with multi-physics simulators. All the features of the 2.856 GHz cavity geometry were precisely engineered for acceleration energies ranging from 100 keV to 500 keV (safety limited) to be powered by our 5 MW S-band klystron. The klystron (Thales TH2163) and modulator system (ScandiNova K1 turnkey system) were successfully installed and tested. Performance tests of the klystron system show peak output power > 5 MW, as per operation specifications. At the quasi-relativistic energies, the electron source is capable of generating 100fC -- 1 pC electron bunch with pulse duration close to 30 fs -- 1 ps and transverse size of a few hundred microns. PIC simulations have shown that the electron bunch undergoes fast RF acceleration, rapidly reaching the desired energies, which can be controlled by tuning RF injection phase and input driving power. It has been shown that it is possible to also focus/compress the bunch longitudinally using a RF-lens, which would allow us to control the temporal resolution of the system as well. While our primary analysis has been performed on a 2.5 cell design, we are also looking into half-cell (single cavity) design that is expected to provide the same range of beam energy with a simple configuration.

Grabenhofer, Alexander↗
DOE OSTI2013

Compact superconducting rf-dipole cavity designs for deflecting and crabbing applications

Over the years the superconducting parallel-bar design has evolved into an rf-dipole cavity with improved properties. The new rf-dipole design is considered for a number of deflecting and crabbing applications. Some of those applications are the 499 MHz rf separator system for the Jefferson Lab 12 GeV upgrade, the 400 MHz crabbing cavity system for the proposed LHC high luminosity upgrade, and the 750 MHz crabbing cavity for the medium energy electron-ion collider in Jefferson Lab. In this paper we present the optimized rf design in terms of rf performance including rf properties, higher order modes (HOM) properties, multipacting and multipole expansion for the above mentioned applications.

De Silva, Subashini↗
DOE OSTI2016

Low reflectance high power RF load

A load for traveling microwave energy has an absorptive volume defined by cylindrical body enclosed by a first end cap and a second end cap. The first end cap has an aperture for the passage of an input waveguide with a rotating part that is coupled to a reflective mirror. The inner surfaces of the absorptive volume consist of a resistive material or are coated with a coating which absorbs a fraction of incident RF energy, and the remainder of the RF energy reflects. The angle of the reflector and end caps is selected such that reflected RF energy dissipates an increasing percentage of the remaining RF energy at each reflection, and the reflected RF energy which returns to the rotating mirror is directed to the back surface of the rotating reflector, and is not coupled to the input waveguide. Additionally, the reflector may have a surface which generates a more uniform power distribution function axially and laterally, to increase the power handling capability of the RF load. The input waveguide may be corrugated for HE11 mode input energy.

43 PARTICLE ACCELERATORS↗
DOE OSTI2017

RF Energy Harvesting Peel-and-Stick Sensors

PARC, a Xerox Company, is developing a low-cost system of peel-and-stick wireless sensors that will enable widespread building environment sensor deployment with the potential to deliver up to 30% energy savings. The system is embodied by a set of RF hubs that provide power to the automatically located sensor nodes, and relays data wirelessly to the building management system (BMS). The sensor nodes are flexible electronic labels powered by rectified RF energy transmitted by a RF hub and can contain multiple printed and conventional sensors. The system design overcomes limitations in wireless sensors related to power delivery, lifetime, and cost by eliminating batteries and photovoltaic devices. The sensor localization is performed automatically by the inclusion of a programmable multidirectional antenna array in the RF hub. Comparison of signal strengths when the RF beam is swept allows for sensor localization, further reducing installation effort and enabling automatic recommissioning of sensors that have been relocated, overcoming a significant challenge in building operations. PARC has already demonstrated wireless power and temperature data transmission up to a distance of 20m with a duty cycle less than a minute between measurements, using power levels well within the FCC regulation limits in the 902-928 MHz ISM band. The sensor’s RF energy harvesting antenna dimensions was less than 5cmx9cm, demonstrating the possibility of small form factor for the sensor nodes.

32 ENERGY CONSERVATION, CONSUMPTION, AND UTILIZATI↗
DOE OSTI2017

PEEL-AND-STICK SENSORS POWERED BY DIRECTED RF ENERGY

PARC, a Xerox Company, is developing a low-cost system of peel-and-stick wireless sensors that will enable widespread building environment sensor deployment with the potential to deliver up to 30% energy savings. The system is embodied by a set of RF hubs that provide power to automatically located sensor nodes, and relay data wirelessly to the building management system (BMS). The sensor nodes are flexible electronic labels powered by rectified RF energy transmitted by an RF hub and can contain multiple printed and conventional sensors. The system design overcomes limitations in wireless sensors related to power delivery, lifetime, and cost by eliminating batteries and photovoltaic devices. Sensor localization is performed automatically by the inclusion of a programmable multidirectional antenna array in the RF hub. Comparison of signal strengths while the RF beam is swept allows for sensor localization, reducing installation effort and enabling automatic recommissioning of sensors that have been relocated, overcoming a significant challenge in building operations. PARC has already demonstrated wireless power and temperature data transmission up to a distance of 20m with less than one minute between measurements, using power levels well within the FCC regulation limits in the 902-928 MHz ISM band. The sensor’s RF energy harvesting antenna achieves high performance with dimensions below 5cm x 9cm.

32 ENERGY CONSERVATION, CONSUMPTION, AND UTILIZATI↗
DOE OSTI2017

Beam Based RF Voltage Measurements and Longitudinal Beam Tomography at the Fermilab Booster

Increasing proton beam power on neutrino production targets is one of the major goals of the Fermilab long term accelerator programs. In this effort, the Fermilab 8 GeV Booster synchrotron plays a critical role for at least the next two decades. Therefore, understanding the Booster in great detail is important as we continue to improve its performance. For example, it is important to know accurately the available RF power in the Booster by carrying out beam-based measurements in order to specify the needed upgrades to the Booster RF system. Since the Booster magnetic field is changing continuously measuring/calibrating the RF voltage is not a trivial task. Here, we present a beam based method for the RF voltage measurements. Data analysis is carried out using computer programs developed in Python and MATLAB. The method presented here is applicable to any RCS which do not have flat-bottom and flat-top in the acceleration magnetic ramps. We have also carried out longitudinal beam tomography at injection and extraction energies with the data used for RF voltage measurements. Beam based RF voltage measurements and beam tomography were never done before for the Fermilab Booster. The results from these investigations will be very useful in future intensity upgrades.

43 PARTICLE ACCELERATORS↗
DOE OSTI2017

RF Sheath-Enhanced Plasma Surface Interaction Studies using Beryllium Optical Emission Spectroscopy in JET ITER-Like Wall

A dedicated study on JET-ILW, deploying two types of ICRH antennas and spectroscopic observation spots at two outboard, beryllium limiters, has provided insight on long-range (up to 6m) RFenhanced plasma-surface interactions (RF-PSI) due to near-antenna electric fields. To aid in the interpretation of optical emission measurements of these effects, the antenna near-fields are computed using the TOPICA code, specifically run for the ITER-like antenna (ILA); similar modelling already existed for the standard JET antennas (A2). In the experiment, both antennas were operated in current drive mode, as RF-PSI tends to be higher in this phasing and at similar power (~0.5 MW). When sweeping the edge magnetic field pitch angle, peaked RF-PSI effects, in the form of 2-4 fold increase in the local Be source,are consistently measured with the observation spots magnetically connect to regions of TOPICAL-calculated high near-fields, particularly at the near-antenna limiters. It is also found that similar RF-PSI effects are produced by the two types of antenna on similarly distant limiters. Although this mapping of calculated near-fields to enhanced RF-PSI gives only qualitative interpretion of the data, the present dataset is expected to provide a sound experimental basis for emerging RF sheath simulation model validation.

Agarici, G.↗
DOE OSTI2023

Multifunctional RF limiting amplifier

Multifunctional RF limiting amplifiers having various configurations and functions are disclosed. In a first configuration, the RF limiting amplifier includes an active load output circuit that allows one to adjust the output impedance based upon the anticipated connected load impedance. In a second configuration, the RF limiting amplifier includes a pair of emitter-followers to buffer the output of a first stage, allowing the RF limiting amplifier to drive one or more second stages. A third configuration includes a pair of RF limiting amplifiers with their outputs mixed to implement a down conversion function. The third configuration may be used to drive dual SAW resonators for detecting the presence of biological or chemical agents. The RF limiting amplifier may be implemented in either bipolar junction transistors or CMOS transistors.

Wessendorf, Kurt O.↗
DOE OSTI2024

Forced RF generation of CW magnetrons for superconducting accelerators

CW magnetrons, designed and optimized for industrial RF heaters, were suggested to power Superconducting RF cavities due to their higher efficiency and lower cost than traditional klystrons, IOT’s, or solid-state amplifiers. RF amplifiers driven by a master-oscillator serve as coherent RF sources. CW magnetrons are regenerative RF generators with a huge regenerative gain. Very large regenerative gain causes instability with intense noise when a magnetron operates with the anode voltage higher than the threshold of self-excitation. Traditionally for stabilization of magnetrons is used injection-locking by a quite small signal. In this case the CW magnetrons do not provide correlation of the magnetron startup with the injection-locking signal. Thus, the magnetron except the injection locked oscillations may generate large noise. This may increase emittance of the beam in SRF accelerators. Recently we have developed mode for forced RF generation of CW magnetrons when the magnetron startup is provided by the injected forcing signal and the regenerative noise is suppressed. The mode is most suitable for SRF accelerators. The mode is briefly described below.

43 PARTICLE ACCELERATORS↗
DOE OSTI2015

An Overview of the MaRIE X-FEL and Electron Radiography LINAC RF Systems

The purpose of the Matter-Radiation Interactions in Extremes (MaRIE) facility at Los Alamos National Laboratory is to investigate the performance limits of materials in extreme environments. The MaRIE facility will utilize a 12 GeV linac to drive an X-ray Free-Electron Laser (FEL). Most of the same linac will also be used to perform electron radiography. The main linac is driven by two shorter linacs; one short linac optimized for X-FEL pulses and one for electron radiography. The RF systems have historically been the one of the largest single component costs of a linac. We will describe the details of the different types of RF systems required by each part of the linacs. Starting with the High Power RF system, we will present our methodology for the choice of RF system peak power and pulselength with respect to klystron parameters, modulator parameters, performance requirements and relative costs. We will also present an overview of the Low Level RF systems that are proposed for MaRIE and briefly describe their use with some proposed control schemes.

43 PARTICLE ACCELERATORS↗
DOE OSTI2021

Energy-angle distribution of the ions in the RF sheath of ICRH antennas

Radio-frequency sheaths forming at the surface of ion cyclotron resonance heating (ICRH) actuators in fusion experiments are associated with enhanced impurity sputtering from ICRH plasma-facing components (PFCs). The minimization of impurity fluxes from the ICRH PFC is a vital task for the usage of ICRH systems. Capturing the ion kinetics is important for an accurate description of plasma–material interactions, because the ion dynamics plays a crucial role in RF sheaths. Here, we present a hybrid particle-in-cell (hPIC) model able to capture the kinetic behavior of the ions. We analyze the kinetic ion energy-angle distributions (IEADs) impacting the RF antenna and its dependence on different plasma and RF sheath parameters. In particular, the IEAD dependence on RF frequency and magnetic field alignment is investigated. Using hPIC, we simulated a case emulating the latest experimental campaign from JET. The simulation showed that under specific plasma and RF parameters, the kinetic motion of ions results in a cusp formation in the IEAD.

71 CLASSICAL AND QUANTUM MECHANICS, GENERAL PHYSIC↗
DOE OSTI2022

N 2 vibrational excitation in atmospheric pressure ns pulse and RF plasma jets

Time-resolved N 2 vibrational temperature and translational–rotational temperature in quasi-two-dimensional atmospheric pressure plasma jets sustained by ns pulse and RF discharges in nitrogen/noble gas mixtures are measured by the broadband vibrational Coherent Anti-Stokes Raman Scattering (CARS) . The results indicate a much stronger vibrational excitation in the RF plasma jet, due to the lower reduced electric field and higher discharge power. In a ns pulse discharge in N 2 /He, N 2 vibrational temperature is significantly lower compared to that in N 2 /Ar, due to the more rapid vibration–translation (V–T) relaxation of nitrogen by helium atoms. In the RF plasma jets in N 2 /Ne and N 2 /Ar, the vibrational excitation increases considerably as the nitrogen fraction in the mixture is reduced. The experimental data in the RF plasma jet in N 2 /Ar jet are compared with the kinetic modeling predictions. The results indicate that nitrogen vibrational excitation in N 2 /Ar plasma jets with a small N 2 fraction in the mixture (several percent) is controlled primarily by electron impact, anharmonic vibration–vibration (V–V) pumping, and V–T relaxation by N atoms. In comparison, V–V energy transfer from the vibrationally excited molecules in the first excited electronic state, N 2 (A 3 Σ u + , v), which are generated primarily by the energy transfer from the metastable Ar atoms, has a minor effect on the vibrational populations of the ground electronic state, N 2 (X 1 Σ g + , v). Although the discharge energy fraction going to electronic excitation is significant, the predicted quasi-steady-state N 2 (A 3 Σ u + ) number density, controlled by the energy pooling and quenching by N atoms, remains relatively low. Because of this, the net rate of N 2 (X 1 Σ g + ) vibrational excitation by the V–V energy transfer from N 2 (A 3 Σ u + ) is much lower compared to that by the direct electron impact. Furthermore, the results show that atmospheric pressure RF plasma jets can be used as sources of highly vibrationally excited N 2 molecules and N atoms.

70 PLASMA PHYSICS AND FUSION TECHNOLOGY↗
DOE OSTI2023

High efficiency, low cost, RF sources for accelerators and colliders

Accelerators for High Energy Physics (HEP) are large users of energy, much of it in the form of radiofrequency (RF) power to accelerate particles to very high energies. Proposed HEP projects will require even larger amounts of RF energy. Increasing concerns of the cost and availability of energy will require the HEP community to use energy as efficiently as possible. Successful transfer of HEP technology to the public and private sectors will be most effective if it is highly efficient. Historically, the HEP community has utilized available RF power sources, mainly in the form of vacuum tube technology, much of which was developed during the cold war or is otherwised used in the private sector. The private sector is moving to solid-state RF sources which do not exhibit the electrical efficiency that is needed for future HEP projects. Here we summarize the state of the development of a number of RF sources that promise efficiencies of 80% and above. We also outline future efforts that are needed to fully realize the potential of these sources.

43 PARTICLE ACCELERATORS↗
DOE OSTI2016

Integrating Nano-patterned Ferromagnetic and Ferroelectric Thin Films for Electrically Tunable RF Applications

Tunable radio frequency (RF) components are pivotal elements in frequency-agile and multifunctional systems. However, there is a technical barrier to achieve miniaturized fully electrically tunable RF components. This paper provides and demonstrates the efficacy of a first unique design methodology in developing fully electrically tunable RF components by integrating ferromagnetic (e.g., Permalloy) and ferroelectric (e.g., Lead Zirconate Titanate: PZT) thin films patterns. Permalloy thin film has been patterned in nanometer scale to improve its ferromagnetic resonance frequency (FMR) for RF applications. Tunable inductors are developed with the utilization of different thickness of Permalloy thin film, which show over 50% increment in inductance and over 4% in tunability with DC current. More tunability can be achieved with multiple layers of Permalloy thin film and optimized thickness. A fully electrically tunable slow wave RF transmission line with simultaneously variable inductance and capacitance density has been implemented and thoroughly investigated for the first time. Measured results show that a fixed phase shift of 90° can be achieved from 1.5 GHz to 1.85 GHz continuously by applying external DC current from 0 to 200 mA and external DC voltage from 0 to 15 Volts, respectively.

47 OTHER INSTRUMENTATION↗
NASA NTRS2012

Strut Shaping of 34m Beam Waveguide Antenna for Reductions in Near-Field RF and Noise Temeperature

Struts shaping of the NASA's Deep Space Network (DSN) 34m Beam Waveguide (BWG) antenna has been implemented to reduce near-field RF exposure while improving the antenna noise temperature. Strut shaping was achieved by introducing an RF shield that does not compromise the structural integrity of the existing structure. Reduction in the RF near-field exposure will compensate for the planned transmit power increase of the antenna from 20 kW to 80 kW while satisfying safety requirements for RF exposure. Antenna noise temperature was also improved by as much as 1.5 K for the low elevation angles and 0.5 K in other areas. Both reductions of RF near-field exposure and antenna noise temperature were verified through measurements and agree very well with calculated results.

reflector↗
DOE OSTI2015

RF breakdown of 805 MHz cavities in strong magnetic fields

Ionization cooling of intense muon beams requires the operation of high-gradient, normal-conducting RF structures in the presence of strong magnetic fields. We have measured the breakdown rate in several RF cavities operating at several frequencies. Cavities operating within solenoidal magnetic fields B > 0.25 T show an increased RF breakdown rate at lower gradients compared with similar operation when B = 0 T. Ultimately, this breakdown behavior limits the maximum safe operating gradient of the cavity. Beyond ionization cooling, this issue affects the design of photoinjectors and klystrons, among other applications. We have built an 805 MHz pillbox-type RF cavity to serve as an experimental testbed for this phenomenon. This cavity is designed to study the problem of RF breakdown in strong magnetic fields using various cavity materials and surface treatments, and with precise control over sources of systematic error. We present results from tests in which the cavity was run with all copper surfaces in a variety of magnetic fields.

43 PARTICLE ACCELERATORS↗