Phase change materials (PCMs) are of increasing interest due to their ability to absorb and store large amounts of thermal energy, with minimal temperature variations. In the phase-change process, these large amounts of thermal energy can be stored with a minimal change in temperature during both the solid/liquid and liquid/vapor phase transitions. As a result, these PCMs are experiencing increased use in applications such as solar energy heating or storage, building insulation, electronic cooling, food storage, and waste heat recovery. Low temperature, nano-enhanced phase change materials (NEPCM) are of particular interest, due to the recent increase in applications related to the shipment of cellular based materials and vaccines, both of which require precise temperature control for sustained periods of time. Information such as PCM and nanoparticle type, the effective goals, and manipulation of PCM thermal properties are assembled from the literature, evaluated, and discussed in detail, to provide an overview of NEPCMs and provide guidance for additional study. Current studies of NEPCMs are limited in scope, with the primary focus of a majority of recent investigations directed at increasing the thermal conductivity and reducing the charging and discharging times. Only a limited number of investigations have examined the issues related to increasing the latent heat to improve the thermal capacity or enhancing the stability to prevent sedimentation of the nanoparticles. In addition, this review examines several other important thermophysical parameters, including the thermal conductivity, phase transition temperature, rheological affects, and the chemical stability of NEPCMs. This is accomplished largely through comparing of the thermophysical properties of the base PCMs and their nano-enhanced counter parts and then evaluating the relative effectiveness of the various types of NEPCMs. Although there are exceptions, for a majority of conventional heat transfer fluids the thermal conductivity of the base PCM generally increases, and the latent heat decreases as the mass fraction of the nanoparticles increases, whereas trends in phase change temperature are often dependent upon the properties of the individual components. A number of recommendations for further study are made, including a better understanding of the stability of NEPCMs such that sedimentation is limited and thus capable of withstanding long-term thermal cycles without significant degradation of thermal properties, along with the identification of those factors that have the greatest overall impact and which PCM combinations might result in the most significant increases in latent heat.
Experiments and atomistic simulations have suggested the existence of a direct correlation between the wetting properties of a surface and heat transfer across it. In this investigation, molecular dynamics simulations of surface wettability and solid-liquid thermal transport were conducted in order to better understand the relationship between the surface chemistry and thermal transport. The wettability transparency of graphene-coated surfaces was considered in order to investigate heat transfer across a complex interface with similar wettability as a bare surface. The results indicate that the relationship between the interfacial heat transfer and wettability is not universal. The density depletion length was found to reconcile the thermal boundary conductance calculations for different bare and graphene-coated silicon surfaces.
Equilibrium and nonequilibrium molecular dynamics simulations were performed to better understand the hydrodynamic behavior of water flowing through silicon nanochannels. The water-silicon interaction potential was calibrated by means of size-independent molecular dynamics simulations of silicon wettability. The wettability of silicon was found to be dependent on the strength of the water-silicon interaction and the structure of the underlying surface. As a result, the anisotropy was found to be an important factor in the wettability of these types of crystalline solids. Using this premise as a fundamental starting point, the hydrodynamic slip in nanoconfined water was characterized using both equilibrium and nonequilibrium calculations of the slip length under low shear rate operating conditions. As was the case for the wettability analysis, the hydrodynamic slip was found to be dependent on the wetted solid surface atomic structure. Additionally, the interfacial water liquid structure was the most significant parameter to describe the hydrodynamic boundary condition. The calibration of the water-silicon interaction potential performed by matching the experimental contact angle of silicon led to the verification of the no-slip condition, experimentally reported for silicon nanochannels at low shear rates.
Equilibrium and nonequilibrium molecular dynamics simulations were conducted in order to evaluate the hypothesis that the hydrodynamic slip length is a surface property. The system under investigation was water confined between two graphite layers to form nanochannels of different sizes (3-8 nm). The water-carbon interaction potential was calibrated by matching wettability experiments of graphitic-carbon surfaces free of airborne hydrocarbon contamination. Three equilibrium theories were used to calculate the hydrodynamic slip length. It was found that one of the recently reported equilibrium theories for the calculation of the slip length featured confinement effects, while the others resulted in calculations significantly hindered by the large margin of error observed between independent simulations. The hydrodynamic slip length was found to be channel-size independent using equilibrium calculations, i.e., suggesting a consistency with the definition of a surface property, for 5-nm channels and larger. The analysis of the individual trajectories of liquid particles revealed that the reason for observing confinement effects in 3-nm nanochannels is the high mobility of the bulk particles. Nonequilibrium calculations were not consistently affected by size but by noisiness in the smallest systems.
In order to better understand the behavior and governing characteristics of the wetting transparency phenomenon observed in graphene-coated surfaces, molecular dynamics simulations were coupled with a theoretical model. Graphene-coated silicon was selected for this analysis, due to potential applications of hybrid silicon-graphene materials as detectors in aqueous environments. The results indicate good agreement between the theory and simulations at the macroscopic conditions required to observe wetting transparency. A microscopic analysis was also conducted in order to identify the parameters, such as the interaction potential energy landscape and the interfacial liquid structure that govern the wetting behavior of graphene-coated surfaces. The interfacial liquid structure was found to be different between uncoated Si(100) and the graphene-coated version and very similar between uncoated Si(111) and the graphene-coated version. However, the concentration of liquid particles for both silicon surfaces was found to be very similar under transparent wetting conditions.
The wettability of graphitic carbon and silicon surfaces was numerically and theoretically investigated. A multi-response method has been developed for the analysis of conventional molecular dynamics (MD) simulations of droplets wettability. The contact angle and indicators of the quality of the computations are tracked as a function of the data sets analyzed over time. This method of analysis allows accurate calculations of the contact angle obtained from the MD simulations. Analytical models were also developed for the calculation of the work of adhesion using the mean-field theory, accounting for the interfacial entropy changes. A calibration method is proposed to provide better predictions of the respective contact angles under different solid-liquid interaction potentials. Estimations of the binding energy between a water monomer and graphite match those previously reported. In addition, a breakdown in the relationship between the binding energy and the contact angle was observed. The macroscopic contact angles obtained from the MD simulations were found to match those predicted by the mean-field model for graphite under different wettability conditions, as well as the contact angles of Si(100) and Si(111) surfaces. Finally, an assessment of the effect of the Lennard-Jones cutoff radius was conducted to provide guidelines for future comparisons between numerical simulations and analytical models of wettability.
Molecular dynamics simulation is used to examine the thermal slip of liquids at rough solid surfaces as characterized by fractal Cantor structures. The temperature profiles, potential energy distributions, thermal slip, and interfacial thermal resistance are investigated and evaluated for a variety of surface topographies. In addition, the effects of liquid-solid interaction, surface stiffness, and boundary condition on thermal slip length are presented. Our results indicate that the presence of roughness expands the low potential energy regions in adjacent liquids, enhances the energy transfer at liquid-solid interface, and decreases the thermal slip. Interestingly, the thermal slip length and thermal resistance for liquids in contact with solid surfaces depends not only on the statistical roughness height, but also on the fractal dimension (i.e., topographical spectrum).
Membranes, Artificial , Models, Chemical , Molecular Dynamics Simulation , Solutions/chemistry , Surface Properties , Computer Simulation , Hydrodynamics , Shear Strength , Stress, Mechanical , Temperature
Thermal management has become a critical issue for high heat flux electronics and energy systems. Integrated two-phase microchannel liquid-cooling technology has been envisioned as a promising solution, but with great challenges in flow instability. In this work, silicon nanowires were synthesized in situ in parallel silicon microchannel arrays for the first time to suppress the flow instability and to augment flow boiling heat transfer. Significant enhancement in flow boiling heat transfer performance was demonstrated for the nanowire-coated microchannel heat sink, such as an early onset of nucleate boiling, a delayed onset of flow oscillation, suppressed oscillating amplitudes of temperature and pressure drop, and an increased heat transfer coefficient.
Customized engineered fibers are currently being used extensively in the aerospace and automobile industries due to the ability to "design in" specific engineering characteristics. Understanding the thermal conductivity of these new fibers is critical for thermal management and design optimization. In the current investigation, a steady-state dc thermal bridge method (DCTBM) is developed to measure the thermal conductivity of individual poly(ether ketone) (PEK)/carbon nanotube (CNT) fibers. For non-conductive fibers, a thin platinum layer was deposited on the test articles to serve as the heater and temperature sensor. The effect of the platinum layer on the thermal conductivity is presented and discussed. DCTBM is first validated using gold and platinum wires (25 µm in diameter) over a temperature ranging from room temperature to 400 K with ±11% uncertainty, and then applied to PEK/CNT fibers with diverse CNT loadings. At a 28 wt. % CNT loading, the thermal conductivity of fibers at 390 K is over 27 Wm(-1)K(-1), which is comparable to some engineering alloys.
A three-dimensional model of laminar flow in microchannels is numerically analyzed incorporating surface roughness effects as characterized by fractal geometry. The Weierstrass-Mandelbrot function is proposed to characterize the multiscale self-affine roughness. The effects of Reynolds number, relative roughness, and fractal dimension on laminar flow are all investigated and discussed. The results indicate that unlike flow in smooth microchannels, the Poiseuille number in rough microchannels increases linearly with the Reynolds number, Re, and is larger than what is typically observed in smooth channels. For these situations, the flow over surfaces with high relative roughness induces recirculation and flow separation, which play an important role in single-phase pressure drop. More specifically, surfaces with the larger fractal dimensions yield more frequent variations in the surface profile, which result in a significantly larger incremental pressure loss, even though at the same relative roughness. The accuracy of the predicted Poiseuille number as calculated by the present model is verified using experimental data available in the literature.
The therapy of focal epilepsy remains inadequate. Many patients who have localization-related seizures find themselves either overmedicated with anticonvulsants or suffering from frequent seizures. While surgical resection can lead to excellent outcomes in up to 60% of patients with neocortical epilepsy, there are obviously many who either fail surgery or are deemed inappropriate surgical candidates. We are currently determining the efficacy of local cooling for the therapy of certain focal epilepsies. We have attempted to adapt new technologies borrowed from electrical and mechanical engineering to develop cooling devices that will ultimately improve the diagnosis and therapy of these focal epilepsies. The present review describes the rationale for this research and our progress to date.
Cold Temperature , Complementary Therapies/methods , Epilepsies, Partial/therapy , Animals , Complementary Therapies/instrumentation , Electroencephalography , Humans
