Interaction of a high current polyenergetic electron beam with metal

A theoretical model has been set up to describe the interaction of a polyenergetic electron beam with metal targets. Since models exist for monoenergetic beams the polyenergetic one is simulated by a superposition of monoenergetic beams with an intensity distribution correlated to the measured energy distribution of the polyenergetic beam. The penetration depth and the energy deposition were calculated according to the impinging beam energy. With this input energy the temperature evolution of the target is computed. The heat flow in the target is described by the one-dimensional nonsteady state heat conduction equation. The latent heats for solid-liquid and liquid-vapor transition are included. The influence of the vapor pressure of the evaporated material on the evaporation temperature of the target was taken into account. The expansion of the vapor was assumed as adiabatic. The theoretical description is compared with experiments and the results are shown