Automated health monitoring of a pulsed power system

Pulsed power systems are used throughout the scientific and industrial communities, from high power microwaves to materials processing. Many of these applications involve the use of high voltage systems, where capacitors are charged in parallel and discharged in either a series or parallel configuration. For very high pulsed power systems, often is the situation whereas the charging time is relatively long (10s of seconds to minutes) compared to the discharge time (less than a millisecond). However, with the advent of high power density electrochemical storage systems, the charging time can be significantly reduced. The marked reduction in charging time can support missions requiring repeated operation without user control. Unfortunately, due to component degradation and corona/breakdown effects, the pulses may also degrade, providing less than optimal operation, or even cause catastrophic damage of the pulsed power system.