Top Hats

Applied Physics Technologies offers custom cathodes that can be fabricated with flat emission surface diameters ranging from a few micrometers to several millimeters, according to your needs. APTech excels at developing specialized cathodes for custom applications and research purposes. For example, in applications requiring high total current in a large beam spot, a (310) oriented crystal, for maximum emission, in a "top hat" configuration may be ideal. Top hat structures can be built for maximum emitting area with modest heating power. These cathodes may be from LaB₆ or CeBix™, with (100) or (310) emitting surface orientations, to provide optimum performance for your application.

Top hats have large area emitting surfaces and are mounted in a stable Mini Vogel Mount (MVM). APTech is dedicated to meeting your custom cathode requirements. We have the facilities to model and experimentally optimize cathode designs and APTech's experienced staff can work with you from the design stage of your project to the final manufacture.

Recently APTech redesigned their top hat configuration. Changes were made to both the top hat crystal dimensions and the method in which the crystals are mounted. The shunted top hat configuration provides added stability and longer lifetimes for our top hat cathodes. APTech provides a shunted top hat of many different materials varying in sizes from 1 mm to 2.8 mm. These cathodes can be mounted on a variety of bases to fit your system configuration. Contact APTech for more information.

New Design