Metamaterial-Enhanced Resistive Wall Amplifier Design Using Periodically Spaced Inductive Meandered Lines

The metamaterial-enhanced resistive wall amplifier (ME-RWA) has been shown to be capable of producing large gains over wide bandwidths. Previous theoretical investigation of the ME-RWA focused on an idealized case using a homogenous dielectric with Drude dispersion to provide the negative permittivity required to achieve high gains. This paper reports the results of investigating practical metamaterial implementations with approximate Drude-type responses that enable the realization of a ME-RWA. Using these metamaterials, an architecture for a ME-RWA using periodically spaced inductive meandered lines is proposed. Our theoretical analyses and particle in cell simulations of this device predict that the proposed technique provides a practical method of implementing ME-RWAs, capable of providing a large gain over a substantial bandwidth.