All-solid-state exciter for high-power, high-repetition-rate excimer laser

An all-solid-state exciter has been developed for a high-power, high-repetition-rate XeCl excimer laser. It is composed of a semiconductor switch using MAGTs (MOS assisted gate-triggered thyristors) and a single-stage magnetic pulse compression circuit (MPC). The semiconductor switch, comprising thirty-two series and two parallel MAGTs, generated a 25 kV, 2 kA, 0.8 /spl mu/s pulse, which was compressed to a 200 ns pulse by the MPC. Continuous operation with an average laser power of 260 W at a repetition rate of 2 kHz was verified by applying the exciter to a XeCl excimer laser. A switch efficiency of 77% was achieved at 2 kHz operation for a switching energy of 11.3 J. Furthermore, 440 mJ, 220 W at 500 Hz was obtained by increasing the switching energy (=33.8 J) and discharge volume. Experimental results verified that this all-solid-state exciter can replace thyratrons.