vacuum electronics
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Silicon carbide (SiC) nanostructure is a type of promising field emitter due to high breakdown field strength, high thermal conductivity, low electron affinity, and high electron mobility. However, the fabrication of the SiC nanotips array is difficult due to its chemical inertness. Here we report a simple, industry-familiar reactive ion etching to fabricate well-aligned, vertically orientated SiC nanoarrays on 4H-SiC wafers. The as-synthesized nanoarrays had tapered base angles >60°, and were vertically oriented with a high packing density >107 mm−2 and high-aspect ratios of approximately 35. As a result of its high geometry uniformity—5% length variation and 10% diameter variation, the field emitter array showed typical turn-on fields of 4.3 V μm−1 and a high field-enhancement factor of ~1260. The 8 h current emission stability displayed a mean current fluctuation of 1.9 ± 1%, revealing excellent current emission stability. The as-synthesized emitters demonstrate competitive emission performance that highlights their potential in a variety of vacuum electronics applications. This study provides a new route to realizing scalable field electron emitter production.

This issue of Defence Science Journal (DSJ) contains a collection of nine manuscripts from National Symposium on Vacuum Electronic Devices and Applications (VEDA-2019). Vacuum Electronic Devices and Applications Society organises VEDA symposium/conference/workshop every year at different locations of India. VEDA has established itself as a leading platform for active and innovative research of microwave tubes. It provides a forum for knowledge sharing and exhibition of theoretical and technological development in the general areas of vacuum electronics devices and its system applications. It organises special session to enhance Research Institutes – Industries and Academia Interaction.

Currently, the increasing interest of researchers is attracted by the theoretical and practical problems of mastering the sub-terahertz and terahertz frequency range. Electronic devices operating in these ranges find effective applications in various fields of science and technology: aerospace equipment, security systems, spectroscopy, medicine, biology and many others. The purpose of this work is to focus on a frequency multiplication device that allows using basic sources of relatively low frequency generation to enter the terahertz frequency range. The results of recent years obtained both on the basis of solid-state effects and with the help of vacuum electronics, in particular, magnetron-type devices, which are characterized by compactness, high resistance to radiation loads, mechanical influences, which is important for on-board equipment, are considered. It is known that at high frequencies, vacuum devices require super-precision manufacturing of decelerating systems. This is essentially the main difficulty. The article proposes a new approach based on the hypothesis of P.L. Kapitsa, which allows to significantly simplify the anode structure of a magnetron multiplier with an acceptable level of output parameters. The achievements of recent years in the field of creating sub-terahertz and terahertz frequency multipliers, mainly for on-board equipment of mobile platforms, taking into account the requirements of aerospace systems, first of all, are noted.

We present a method for the teaching of Electronics, defined as the scientific discipline that studies the movement and behavior of electrons in semiconductor materials and in vacuum. Electronics can be considered as a science with a solid physical foundation. Within the field of Electronics there are different disciplines, some of them can be considered as pure science, and some others are more oriented to applications. Our methodology has been applied to the wide range of courses that develop the different approaches to Electronics, from the physics of semiconductors or the physics of microelectronic devices, generally taught at physics faculties, to microelectronic fabrication technology or microelectronic design, subjects that typically have a more application oriented character. To ensure an effective learning of these subjects, a teaching-learning model has been established. This model involves the criteria for developing the programs and defining objectives, as well as the development of a series of activities in which the methods, techniques, forms of presentation and didactic resources most useful to achieve the proposed objectives will be used, and an evaluation system that assesses the effectiveness of the educational process and detects its anomalies.

The electron devices in which electrons do not collide with other particles or in which the collision probability is very small in the transport process can be theoretically regarded as general vacuum electron devices. General vacuum electron devices include microfabricated vacuum nano-electronic devices, which can work in atmosphere, and some solid-state electron devices with nanoscale channel for electrons whose material characteristics are close to those of vacuum channels. Vacuum nano-electron devices (e.g., nanotriodes) are expected to be the fundamental elements for high-speed, radiation-resistant large-scale vacuum integrated circuits. The solid-state electron devices with spin semiconductor materials, multiferroics or topological crystal insulators are quite different from traditional semiconductor devices and are expected to operate under novel principles. Understanding vacuum electron devices from a microcosmic perspective and understanding solid-state electron devices from a vacuum perspective will promote a union of vacuum electronics and microelectronics, as well as the formation and development of general vacuum electronics.