Analysis of electron dynamics in non-ideal Penning traps

Penning traps that are used for particular applications, such as in ion pump technology, Larmor, bouncing, and diocotron frequencies, can be of the same order of magnitude. The paper deals with the dynamics of electrons confined in such devices starting from the study of the properties of the trajectories. In cases of interest, in which electron-neutral collision frequency is much smaller with respect to the characteristic frequencies of the motion, suitable time averages of the trajectories are introduced in order to simplify the analysis of the problem. In the work, time averages have been calculated in a simple way by using an approximate r-z decoupling of the effective potential. Results obtained with the method are presented and discussed in both linear and nonlinear regimes. © 2012 American Institute of Physics.