Characteristics of an Annular Electron Flow Formed by an Electron Gun With a Field Emitter

Characteristics of annular electron flow formed in electron gun with a multitip field emitter were determined experimentally and by numerical simulations, and the possibility to achieve electron beam current up to 75 mA was demonstrated. The gun performance was stable in technical vacuum conditions—at the pressure of ~10
⁻⁷
torr. Electron velocity distributions in a flow on transverse and longitudinal components were determined. It was shown that the relative root-mean-square transverse velocity spread varied with radial coordinate within the annular beam wall from ca. 6% to 30%, while the total spread in the electron flow was about 60%.