Electroporation technology can be used in biomedicine, food safety, sewage treatment and other fields. The pulse waveform is an important parameter affecting electroporation efficiency.

This study aims to propose a distributed arbitrary waveform high-voltage pulse generator composed of multiple standard pulse power modules to meet the needs of controllable electroporation.

Firstly, based on full bridge inverter structure, the framework of the distributed generator with bipolar all solid state Marx topology was designed, and the basic working principle of the main circuit of standard module was elaborated. Then, the power and load parameters were simulated and analyzed using Simulink module of MATLAB software. Based on the simulation results, a prototype generator composed of two standard modules in series was built, and the resistance load test was carried out. Finally, under the condition of the same pulse amplitude and pulse energy, the electroporation experiment of microalgae was carried out to verify the correctness and feasibility of high-voltage pulse generator.

The generator can output arbitrary pulse waveform of ±8 kV with 33 electrical levels. Under the condition of pulse amplitude 8 kV and pulse energy 0.4 J, the electroporation efficiencies of positive square wave and exponential attenuation wave are 65.25% and 46.15%, respectively.

The applicability of the generator proposed in this study is demonstrated in the controllable electroporation experiment, and the electroporation efficiency of square wave with constant amplitude and energy is higher than that of exponential attenuation wave.