Abstract
In this introduction to the Special Issue on vacuum electronics,
the history, operating principles, and recent technological trends of
vacuum electronic devices are reviewed. The development of microwave
power tubes is described and improvements in these devices over the past
quarter of a century are highlighted. These improvements have been
substantial and have been driven by modern high-power applications and
by advances in materials and computational science. The second part of
this paper describes the advent of a new class of vacuum electronics
generator as involving relativistic electron beams and interaction with
fast waves (e.g., gyrotrons, free-electron lasers). These new types of
generators are opening the electromagnetic spectrum beyond the microwave
region (i.e., millimeter-wave, infrared, ultraviolet, and even X-ray)
for applications of high-power, coherent generators of electromagnetic
radiation
Description
Welcome to IEEE Xplore 2.0: Vacuum electronics at the dawn of the twenty-first century
