High-Power Solid-State Power Amplifier System

NASA Marshall Space Flight Center (MSFC) has developed a High-Power Solid-State Power Amplifier System that combines 1-KW modules (16 amps total) to generate up to 16KW of radio frequency (RF) power from 230 MHz. The NASA device is a first step toward increasing the power of solid-state power amp devices so that they might replace the more cumbersome vacuum tube amps for some applications. Also, when vacuum tube amps fail, a total power failure occurs. Since the NASA device is a system of amplifiers, it enables graceful failure, meaning one or more stages can fail and the system will continue to operate, although at reduced power.