Project Title:
A Distributed, Menu-Driven Software Tool for the Design of Traveling Wave Tubes
14.05-9392
911738
A Distributed, Menu-Driven Software Tool for the Design of Traveling Wave Tubes
Analatom, Inc.
1183 Bordeaux Drive, #1
Sunnyvale
CA
94089
Wolfgang
Mueller
408-734-9392
LeRC
NAS3-26390
285
14.05-9392
911738
Abstract:
A Distributed, Menu-Driven Software Tool for the Design of Traveling Wave Tubes
A software package will be developed for the design of traveling wave tubes (TWT)
. The package integrates a menu-driven, a graphical user interface, advanced networking,
and distributed processing among workstations and supercomputers in a single application.
This computational tool is geared toward the R&D engineer, with particular emphasis
on space communications applications. Phase I will concentrate on codes modeling
the interaction between the electron beam and radio-frequency fields in helical and
coupled-cavity TWTs. Provisions will be made to include additional codes for electron
gun and collector design in Phase II, such that complete device simulations will
become available. The efficiency of existing codes will be enhanced by code-specific
vectorization, optimization, and parallel-processing techniques. Advanced numerical
techniques from the environment of computational fluid dynamics research and present
modeling capabilities will be further refined. The final product will be an efficient,
user-friendly, interactive computational tool that will dramatically improve the
TWT simulation process and thereby reduce the development time and cost for advanced
electron devices.
Traveling wave tubes are major components in satellites for near-earth and deep-space
communications, high-resolution radar systems for air traffic control and weather
forecasting, microwave power transmission devices, and microwave instrumentation.
The developed tool would be used by the design engineer for device optimization before
hardware implementation.
traveling wave tubes, distributed processing, computer-based simulation and design,
menu-driven graphical user interface