Development of a High-Power Gyrotron for Beamed Energy Propulsion Applications

A high-power gyrotron is under development to investigate the thrust generation by the incident microwave beam for the beamed energy propulsion rocket. The beam frequency is set at 94 GHz which is the window frequency of air. The target output power is 600 kW at maximum. A mode converter is installed to deliver a Gaussian beam. The electron gun of the gyrotron is a diode type. The electrodes were designed by using the EGUN code. The power supply is composed of a capacitor bank and a high voltage switching devise. This power supply can charge the capacitor bank at 80 kV at maximum. This study is the first gyrotron development in the field of the aerospace.