Theoretical study of the electrical power behavior of a cesium thermionic converter for switching resistive and reactive loads

Pulsed ionized diodes have shown to be an attractive mode to develop thermionic converters (Rasor, 1972). Usually the investigations have been focused to work with additive gases and constant loads at steady state (Zherebtsov et al, 1984 and McVey, 1991). The experimental transient graphs reported suggest a dynamic behavior of the thermionic converter. Periods of the order of 300 /spl mu/s have been reported for the decay time of voltage and current, a condition that is similar to a capacitive discharge. A circuit model for a thermionic converter to define this condition is proposed. Using this model, an electrical analysis of the thermionic converter power with different switching loads is made. Both, resistive and reactive loads are connected. Special emphasis is dedicated to determine the resonance frequencies.