A compact repetitive high-voltage nanosecond pulse generator for the application of gas discharge

Uniform and stable discharge plasma requires very short duration pulses with fast rise times. A repetitive high-voltage nanosecond pulse generator for the application of gas discharge is presented in this paper. It is constructed with all solid-state components. Two-stage magnetic compression is used to generate a short duration pulse. Unlike in some reported studies, common commercial fast recovery diodes instead of a semiconductor opening switch (SOS) are used in our experiment that plays the role of SOS. The SOS-like effects of four different kinds of diodes are studied experimentally to optimize the output performance. It is found that the output pulse voltage is higher with a shorter reverse recovery time, and the rise time of pulse becomes faster when the falling time of reverse recovery current is shorter. The SOS-like effect of the diodes can be adjusted by changing the external circuit parameters. Through optimization the pulse generator can provide a pulsed voltage of 40 kV with a 40 ns duration, 10 ns rise time, and pulse repetition frequency of up to 5 kHz. Diffuse plasma can be formed in air at standard atmospheric pressure using the developed pulse generator. With a light weight and small packaging the pulse generator is suitable for gas discharge application. (C) 2011 American Institute of Physics. [doi:10.1063/1.3572265]