Increasing the Output Power of Two-Stroke Pulse Sharpeners Based on Step Recovery Diodes

Authors: Semenov E. V., Pozdnyakov V. S., Poltoryhin K. M., Berezin A. A.

Annotation: The proposed two-stroke pulse sharpeners have a relatively low output power (1.5 W). This limits the use of such sharpeners for their intended purpose: for observing small nonlinear ultra-wideband responses from objects in diagnostic, measuring and radar systems. In the article an approach to increase the output power of a sharpener is considered. At this approach the output pulse is created not by discharging the capacitance to the load, but by switching the current flowing through an inductive ener-gy storage to the load. When the voltages in the circuit are lim-ited (by bias sources), energy storage in the current form makes it possible to increase the output power of the sharpener to 3.4 W, and the slew rate of the output voltage from 34 to 46 V/ns.

Keywords: picosecond pulses, sharpeners, step recovery diodes, nonlinear pulse measurements