Innovative bremsstrahlung research at Physics International Company

For bremsstrahlung diodes optimized for X-ray production below 2 MeV, the area-weighted mean dose in the near-field is controlled by the atomic number, Z, of the converter material, and the electrical power, P, into the diode, scaling approximately as ZP. However, given the constraints of a fixed electrical power pulse from a generator, one can still vary the end-point voltage of the bremsstrahlung radiation without significant sacrifice in X-ray dose, or sharpen the risetime of the X-ray pulse without sacrificing the average dose-rate. In this paper, the authors review the design of a triple series diode on the Double-EAGLE generator which reduces the end-point voltage of the bremsstrahlung source from 1.5 MV down to 0.3 MV. In addition, they discuss pulse sharpening of the radiation from a pinched beam diode by optimizing the dimension of the tantalum converter. Also, they review some recent work on a linear bremsstrahlung diode which in principle can form part of a large-area bremsstrahlung source for a multi-module pulsed power generator