Comparative study of envelope models for hybrid time- and frequency-domain simulation of traveling-wave tubes

A selection of hybrid frequency- and time-domain approaches is evaluated with respect to their suitability for predicting the multi-tone behavior of a reference Ku-band helix traveling-wave tube. For this, a frequency-domain code is extended by a selection of frequency-dependent and frequency-independent envelope models and compared to a number of simulated and measured responses to two-tone signal excitation with varying frequency spacing. The selected envelope methods are investigated both in the hybrid approach and based on measured TWT characteristics. Output levels and classical multi-tone metrics, such as intermodulation products and phase transfer factors, are considered. By reducing a modulation scenario to a number of significant sequences, a comparison to full physics-based frequency-domain simulation is presented to show the potential of the proposed approach.