METHOD FOR CREATING AN ACCELERATED FLOW OF IONS Russian patent published in 2007 - IPC H05H1/54 

FIELD: plasma engineering, plasma technologies, in particular - plasma accelerators with closed drift of electrons and also methods for creating accelerated flows of ions by means of aforementioned accelerators.

SUBSTANCE: method include feeding working substance into discharge chamber of plasma accelerator with closed drift of electrons. In azimuthally locked channel of discharge chamber, limited by outside and inside walls, magnetic field is formed with primary direction of field induction from one chamber wall to opposite chamber wall. Electric discharge in crossed electric and magnetic fields is created and maintained by feeding to anode mounted in discharge chamber and to cathode mounted behind the cut of discharge chamber, of voltage impulses with periodically repeating sequence. Period T₀ of voltage impulse repeat does not exceed fly-through time of working substance atom along discharge chamber of plasma accelerator, τ_a=L/V_a, where L - length of discharge chamber in ion acceleration direction, V_a - thermal speed of working substance atoms in discharge chamber, while duration of voltage impulses T_i is selected from condition 2L/V_i≤T_i≤T₀, where V_i - maximal speed of ions beyond the cut of discharge chamber. For creation of accelerated flow of ions several plasma accelerators or several groups of plasma accelerators may be used, while number N of plasma accelerators of plasma accelerator groups is selected from condition N≤T₀/T_i. In current case serial-alternating feeding of impulses onto anode and cathode of each plasma accelerator or each plasma accelerator group is performed. For realization of ion acceleration process a single cathode common for all plasma accelerators may be used.

EFFECT: increased efficiency of ion acceleration due to decreased energy losses connected to electronic component of discharge current.

1 cl, 6 dwg