Multimodal characterization of the multipactor effect in microwave waveguide components

Multipactor effect is a resonant avalanche of secondary electrons induced by an RF electromagnetic field, which endangers high-power payloads on satellites and particle accelerator structures. The main goal of this letter is to present a multimodal network characterization of a multipactor discharge occurring in a bounded waveguide region. This will allow to perform a rigorous analysis of a complete passive component considering the presence of a discharge. In order to verify the present formulation, we have measured the power spectrum generated by a multipactor event excited in a simple microwave circuit based on rectangular waveguides, which has been compared with the theoretical results, obtaining good agreement. © 2006 IEEE.