A cold cathode ion source with a magnetic hollow cathode

A new concept of effective plasma generation from a cold cathode discharge could be developed, which is based on a hollow cathode in combination with a special geometry of a magnetic field inside. In principle, inside a cavity the electric field from the anode is crossed by the magnetic field at well defined positions. By the resulting cycloidal motion of the electrons the ionization probability of the electrons per unit length can be enhanced. In this way the typical working pressure and the gas consumption of several ion sources can be significantly improved using the so called magnetic hollow cathode (MHC) as a module. (orig.)