Rapid Formation of High Density Microwave discharges for Application in Counter-HPM Protection

Recent decades of research on high power microwave (HPM) sources for non-lethal electronic attack have prompted an interest in research on protection counter-measures. The Central Consortium for High Power Microwaves (UC-Berkeley, Michi-gan, Michigan State, Texas Tech and Wisconsin) is studying basic questions related to assessing rapidly-formed, self-initiated, distributed discharges as a means of protect-ing sensitive electronics from HPM irradiation. Collectively, the consortium investiga-tions encompass two orders of magnitude in frequency, from 1-100 GHz. At the Uni-versity of Wisconsin, we are conducting experiments using short pulses (< 1 Ï-s) of high power X-band radiation. This talk will discuss some of the interesting initial results, including the impact of varying gas composition and pressure as well as the time in-terval between repetitive pulses and pulse trains. The results will probably raise more questions than they answer, but then that is exactly when things usually get exciting in research!
John H. Booske received the Ph.D. degree in nuclear engineering from the Univ. of Michigan in 1985 after which he was a Research Scientist at the Univ. of Maryland, College working on magnetically confined hot ion plasmas and sheet-electron-beam free electron lasers. Since 1990, he has been with the Dept. of Electrical and Computer Engineering at the Univ. of Wisconsin-Madison (UW), where he is Chair of ECE, Director of the Wisconsin Collaboratory for Enhanced Learning, and the Bluemke Prof. of Engineering. John's research interests include experimental and theoretical study of coherent electromagnetic radiation, its sources and its applications, spanning the RF, microwave, millimeter-wave, and THz regimes, as well as plasma science and applications. John has received the UW Vilas Associate Award for research, the NSF Presidential Young Investigator Award and numerous teaching awards. John is a Fellow of the IEEE and the American Physical Society.