Phase change through boiling is used in a variety of heat-transfer and chemical reaction applications. The state of the art in nucleate boiling has focused on increasing the density of bubble nucleation using porous structures and microchannels with characteristic sizes of tens of micrometers. Traditionally, it is thought that nanoscale surfaces will not improve boiling heat transfer, since the bubble nucleation process is not expected to be enhanced by such small cavities. In the experiments reported here, we observed unexpected enhancements in boiling performance for a nanostructured copper (Cu) surface formed by the deposition of Cu nanorods on a Cu substrate. Moreover, we observed striking differences in the dynamics of bubble nucleation and release from the Cu nanorods, including smaller bubble diameters, higher bubble release frequencies, and an approximately 30-fold increase in the density of active bubble nucleation sites. It appears that the ability of the Cu surface with nanorods to generate stable nucleation of bubbles at low superheated temperatures results from a synergistic coupling effect between the nanoscale gas cavities (or nanobubbles) formed within the nanorod interstices and micrometer-scale defects (voids) that form on the film surface during nanorod deposition. For such a coupled system, the interconnected nanoscale gas cavities stabilize (or feed) bubble nucleation at the microscale defect sites. This is distinct from conventional-scale boiling surfaces, since for the nanostructured surface the bubble nucleation stability is provided by features with orders-of-magnitude smaller scales than the cavity-mouth openings.

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Nanostructured copper interfaces for enhanced boiling.

Phase change materials (PCMs) have been extensively characterized as constant temperature latent heat thermal energy storage (TES) materials. Nevertheless, the widespread utilization of PCMs is limited due to the flow of liquid PCMs during melting, phase separation, supercooling and low heat transfer rate. In order to overcome these inherent problems and to improve thermo-physical properties, the confinement of PCMs at the nanoscale has been identified as a versatile strategy, which ensures the encapsulation of PCMs in much smaller nano-containers. Such strategies including core–shell, longitudinal, interfacial and porous confinement have been widely presented in recent years to efficiently encapsulate PCMs in nanospaces and are presenting attractive ways to enhance thermal performance. This review summarizes the recent advancement and critical issues of nanoconfinement technologies of PCMs from the point of view of material design. In addition, the potential applications of nanoconfined PCMs in diverse fields, including energy conversion and storage, thermal rectification and temperature controlled drug delivery systems, are presented in detail. Finally, the major drawbacks associated with nanoconfined PCMs and their prospective solutions are also provided.

Nanoconfined phase change materials for thermal energy applications

Effects of inlet/outlet configurations on flow boiling instability in parallel microchannels

This review focuses on advances reported from April 2009 to May 2011 in PDMS surface modifications for the application in microfluidic devices. PDMS surface modification techniques presented here include improved plasma and graft polymer coating, dynamic surfactant treatment, hydrosilylation-based surface modification and surface modification with nanomaterials such as carbon nanotubes and metal nanoparticles. Recent efforts to generate topographical and chemical patterns on PDMS are also discussed. The described surface modifications not only increase PDMS wettability, inhibit or reduce non-specific adsorption of hydrophobic species onto the surfaces in the act, but also result in the display of desired functional groups useful for molecular separations, biomolecular detection via immunoassays, cell culture and emulsion formation.

Surface modification for PDMS-based microfluidic devices

Depleting energy resources have become the driving force for their conservation. Increasing the system efficiencies is one method by which sustainability of energy may be ensured, for which miniaturization has successfully provided solutions. Miniature heat exchangers, owing to their high thermal performance, have the potential to provide energy efficient systems. In addition, their characteristics of compactness, small size and lesser weight have attracted widespread applications. Various works on micro- and minichannel heat exchangers as heat sinks and heat exchangers have been reviewed in this paper. Currently employed fabrication techniques and different applications have been summarized. An overview of the single-phase thermo-hydraulic studies in micro- and minichannel heat sinks has been presented. Literatures related co-current, counter-current and cross-current micro- and minichannel heat exchangers have been discussed. Finally, the persisting lacunae of this technology drawn from the review have been pointed out.

Review of micro- and mini-channel heat sinks and heat exchangers for single phase fluids

Three dimensional numerical analyses and optimization of offset strip-fin microchannel heat sinks

Conjugate heat transfer in fractal-shaped microchannel network heat sink for integrated microelectronic cooling application

A fully coupled numerical simulation of sessile droplet evaporation using Arbitrary Lagrangian–Eulerian formulation

Temperature gradients aroused from the Joule heating in a non-uniform electrical field can induce inhomogeneities of electric conductivity and permittivity of the electrolyte, thus causing an electrothermal force that generates flow motion. A 2D numerical investigation of a micromixer, utilizing electrothermal effect to enhance its mixing efficiency, is proposed in this paper. Results for temperature and velocity distributions, as well as sample concentration distribution are obtained for an electrolyte solution in a microchannel with different pairs of electrodes under AC potentials with various frequencies. Numerical solutions were first carried out for one pair of electrodes, with a length of 10 μm separated by a gap of 10 μm, on one side wall of a microchannel having a length of 200 μm and a height of 50 μm. It is found that the electrothermal flow effect, in the frequency range for which Coulomb force is predominant, induces vortex motion near the electrodes, thus stirring the flow streams and enhancing its mixing efficiency. If more than one pair of electrodes is located on the opposite walls of the microchannel, the mixing efficiency depends on the AC potential applied pattern and the electrodes arrangement pattern. The distance between two pairs of electrodes on two opposite walls is then optimized numerically. Sample mixing efficiencies, using KCl solutions as the working fluid in microchannels with different number of electrodes pairs at optimal electrodes arrangement pattern, are also investigated. If root mean squared voltages of 10 V in an AC frequency range of 0.1–10 MHz are imposed on 16 pairs of electrodes separated at an optimal distance, the numerical results show that a mixing efficiency of 98% can be achieved at the end of the microchannel having a length of 700 μm and a height of 50 μm at Re = 0.01 Pe
 C = 100, and Pe
 T = 0.07. However, the mixing efficiency decreases sharply at a frequency higher than 10 MHz owing to the drastically decrease in the Coulomb force.

A numerical study of an electrothermal vortex enhanced micromixer

Recent work on miscroscale phase-change heat transfer, including flow boiling and flow condensation in microchannnels (with applications to microchannel heat sinks and microheat exchangers) as well as bubble growth and collapse on microheaters under pulse heating (with applications to micropumps and thermal inkjet printerheads), is reviewed

Fangjun Hong

Papers

Three dimensional numerical analyses and optimization of offset strip-fin microchannel heat sinks

Conjugate heat transfer in fractal-shaped microchannel network heat sink for integrated microelectronic cooling application

A fully coupled numerical simulation of sessile droplet evaporation using Arbitrary Lagrangian–Eulerian formulation

A numerical study of an electrothermal vortex enhanced micromixer

Phase-Change Heat Transfer in Microsystems