Ionization vacuum gauge
AssigneeVarian, Inc.
InventorRaffaele Correale
Life of this patent
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Abstract
An ionisation vacuum gauge for measuring the residual pressure of a gaseous material remaining in a container (10), more particularly after operation of a vacuum pump comprises an electron-emitting cathode (31) made by exploiting the nanotube technology, a grid (13; 33; 133; 133′) for accelerating the electrons emitted by the cathode, and a plate (15; 35) collecting the ions and/or the ionised positive molecules of the gas. Measuring the plate current by a galvanometer allows for determining the value of the residual pressure inside the container.
Claims26
An ionisation vacuum gauge for measuring the residual pressure of a gaseous material in a container (10) comprising:
- an electron-emitting cathode (31), said cathode is formed by a plurality of nanotubes, distributed over a surface of said cathode,
- a grid (13;
- 33;
- 133;
- 133′) for accelerating the electrons emitted by said cathode,
- a plate (15;
- 35) for collecting the ionised positive molecules of said gaseous material,
- said plate (35) disposed outside of said accelerating grid (33:133;133′) and
- a galvanometer (21) connected to said plate for measuring the plate current to determine the value of the residual pressure inside the container.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.