Introduction To High Power Pulse Technology (ADVANCED SERIES IN ELECTRICAL AND COMPUTER ENGINEERING)

Description

This book is designed primarily to meet two objectives. It is intended to serve as a textbook for a one-semester university course for graduate or senior undergraduate students in the physical sciences, electrical engineering and other related disciplines, or it may be used as a reference book for those who are working in the field. For those intending to use the book for self-study, a general knowledge of electromagnetism, electrical circuitry and plasma and discharge physics is necessary. In order to meet these diverse objectives, the authors have attempted to make the book reasonably compact so that it can fit in a one-semester schedule while retaining its comprehensiveness in serving as a reference book. The contents are arranged so that theory and practice are proportionally balanced and each topic consists of essentially four basic elements: fundamental principles, mathematical expressions and formulas, examples and illustrations, numerical data and applications. In order to keep its compactness, lengthy theoretical discussions and detailed mathematical derivations are avoided whenever possible. Review: Difficult Book on Pulse Power Design-Workings - A small book that gets into the black arts of high power, high voltage pulse power technology. Basic illustrations but difficult to read. It's a primer into plus power design. Pulse power might look simple but in practice the physics are complex. Review: ...Good and bad... - The good: This book covers many diverse aspects of pulsed power technology, including insulation, switching, pulse generators, and diagnostics. Also, it is a decent quick-reference for formulas and material parameters (e.g., bulk breakdown strength of materials). Finally, it's a lot cheaper/easier to find than the book by Mesyats, the MIT Radiation Lab report Vol. 5, and "J.C. Martin on Pulsed Power." The bad: This book is not very well written or organized in general. For example, I have never seen a more muddled and confusing explanation of Blumlein operation. Also, the explanation of Marx generator operation (e.g., effect of stray capacitance) is not clear either. These are just specific examples of exposition that is just generally not clear. Also, the authors cite Chinese literature a just bit too often, which (1) is not very accessible, and (2) is probably not as important as the IEEE conference proceedings. If you want to know only about PFLs, PFNs, and impulse generators, I would strongly suggest "Transient Electronics" by P. W. Smith over this book. If you need to know something about switching and diagnostics, then maybe this book will suffice. I would not use this as your only source of pulsed power information.