LaB6 emitters are becoming increasingly popular as direct replacements for tungsten filaments in the electron guns of modern electron-beam instruments. These emitters offer order of magnitude increases in beam brightness, and, with appropriate care in operation, a corresponding increase in source lifetime. They are, however, an order of magnitude more expensive, and may be easily damaged (by improper vacuum conditions and thermal shock) during saturation/desaturation operations. These operations typically require several minutes of an operator's attention, which becomes tedious and subject to error, particularly since the emitter must be cooled during sample exchanges to minimize damage from random vacuum excursions. We have designed a control system for LaBg emitters which relieves the operator of the necessity for manually controlling the emitter power, minimizes the danger of accidental improper operation, and makes the use of these emitters routine on multi-user instruments.Figure 1 is a block schematic of the main components of the control system, and Figure 2 shows the control box.
