Study of Properties of Structural Materials of Powerful Pulsed Plasma Facilities under Extreme Loads

The effect of high-current relativistic electron beams on samples made of polycrystalline tungsten (Goodfellow) and corrosion-resistant ferrite-martensitic steel EK-181 was studied experimentally. In the experiments, a combined (molybdenum and steel) cathode was used, which made it possible to minimize the deposition of the cathode plasma on the materials under study. The experiments were carried out on a Kalmar high-current electron accelerator with an average pulse energy of E ≈ 100 J. A series of 1, 3, 6, and 10 pulses of accelerator operation were carried out for each material. The dependences of the mass ablation on the number of pulses were obtained. The microscopic examination of irradiated samples was carried out.