Photoconductive Switching of an Air-Filled High-Voltage Spark Gap: Pushing the Limits of Spark Gap Switching

In this contribution we present the recent results on photoconductive spark gap switching. This new way of switching combines the benefits of both laser-triggered spark gap switches and photoconductive semiconductor switches. High voltages can now be switched with rise times of the order ps and almost no time jitter. We will also show that for this new way of switching, conventional theory is no longer sufficient to describe the switching behavior. A new approach of theoretical spark gap optimization is required to push the limits further