Limitations to compacting a parallel-plate Blumlein pulse-forming line

For the applications of compact pulsed-power systems, we propose a model for optimizing the pulse-forming line (PFL) with respect to the optimum pulse generation. There are multiple parameters that play important and conflicting roles in the design of a PFL. The original notion that a pulse, of a desired duration, can be created and the length of the line shortened by using a dielectric with sufficiently high permittivity, is shown here to be overly simplified, and that it can lead to a deformed pulse instead. In this work, new criteria for successful pulse formation are proposed and their validity demonstrated. (C) 2008 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.