Glasoe G.N., Lebacqz J.V. (ed.) Pulse Generators

New York: McGraw-Hill, 1948. — 741 p. — (MIT Radiation Laboratory Series. Volume 5)When the Radiation Laboratory was organized in the fall of 1940 in order to provide the armed services with microwave radar, one in of the important technical problems facing this group was that of devising equipment capable of delivering high-power pulses to the newly developed cavity-magnetron oscillator. To be sure, some techniques for generating electrical pulses were available at this time. However, the special characteristics of these magnetrons and the requirements imposed by the operation of a microwave-radar system (high pulse power, short pulse duration, and high recurrence frequency) made it evident that new techniques had to be developed.
During the existence of the Radiation Laboratory the group assigned to the problem of pulse generation grew from a nucleus of about five people to an organization of more than ten times this number. The coordinated efforts of this group extended the development of pulse generators considerably beyond the original requirement of 100-kw pulses with a duration of 1 psec and a recurrence frequency of 1000 pps. The development extended to both higher and lower powers, longer and shorter pulses, and lower and higher recurrence frequencies. Besides the improvement of existing techniques, it was necessary to devise entirely new methods and to design new components to provide satisfactory pulse generators for radar applications. The use of a lumped-constant transmission line (line-simulating network) to generate pulses of specific pulse duration and shape was carried to a high state of development. As a result of work both on transformers that could be used for short pulses and high pulse powers and on new switching devices, highly efficient and flexible pulse generators using line-simulating networks were available at the end of the war. Concurrent with the work at the Radiation Laboratory, a large amount of work was done at similar laboratories in Great Britain, Canada, and Australia, and at many commercial laboratories in this country and abroad.