Simulation and experimental study on low vacuum operation characteristics of an L band MILO

Plasma filling has been widely used as an effective method to improve the performance of Cerenkov devices. In the process of designing a hard-tube MILO, we found that it might improve the output power largely without obvious pulse shortening at a low vacuum range of 0.01~2 Pa, which had not been reported on MILO previously. Experimental method associated with PIC simulation was adopted to investigate the performance of an L band ladder cathode MILO at low vacuum levels. The result tells that the MILO could work better at low vacuum levels.