A travelling-wave tube comprising a helix joined by posts to a vacuum chamber, each post made of electrically insulating material being covered by an electrically conductive material, of electrical conductivity comprised between 1000 and 100000 S.Math.m−1, over a portion of the post extending from the end of the post joined to the helix to the end of the post joined to the vacuum chamber and corresponding to a height comprised between 10% and 50% of the post.

A travelling-wave tube comprising a helix joined by posts to a vacuum chamber, each post made of electrically insulating material being covered by an electrically conductive material, of electrical conductivity comprised between 1000 and 100000 S.Math.m1, over a portion of the post extending from the end of the post joined to the helix to the end of the post joined to the vacuum chamber and corresponding to a height comprised between 10% and 50% of the post.

A depressed collector, comprises an insulator body; a plurality of serial electrodes, each serial electrode having a serial electrode receptor portion inside the insulator body and having a serial electrode thermal fin portion passing through and extending outside the insulator body; and a terminal electrode having a terminal electrode receptor portion inside the insulator body and having a terminal electrode thermal fin portion passing through and extending outside the insulator body.

A depressed beam collector and an RF source comprising a depressed beam collector. The RF source may include, e.g., a multi-beam klystron, a single beam klystron, or other RF sources having an electron gun. The beam collector collects spent electrons from the electron gun and comprises a grounded portion configured to collect a portion of electrons entering the collector and a biased portion configured to collect another portion of the electrons entering the collector and having a depressed energy.