Two surface multipactor discharge with two-frequency rf fields and space-charge effects

This paper presents two-surface multipactor discharge with two-frequency rf fields using Monte Carlo simulations and Computer Simulation Technology (CST) Particle Studio. The effects of the relative strength and phase of the second carrier mode on multipactor susceptibility and time dependent physics are studied. Compared to single-frequency rf operation, shrinkage of multipactor susceptibility regions is observed for different configurations of two-frequency rf operation. The presence of a second carrier mode in the rf field results in mixed multipactor modes in which electrons take a fixed time period to complete a round trip between the two surfaces, while the time for electrons to traverse the gap in each direction is found to be different. CST simulation reveals that the space-charge effect reduces the electron growth rate and causes shrinkage of multipactor susceptibility bands.