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Enhanced heat transport in partitioned thermal convection

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  06 November 2015

Yun Bao ,
Jun Chen ,
Bo-Fang Liu ,
Zhen-Su She ,
Jun Zhang  and
Quan Zhou
Yun Bao
Affiliation:
State Key Laboratory for Turbulence and Complex Systems and Department of Mechanics and Engineering Science, College of Engineering, Peking University, Beijing 100871, China Department of Mechanics, Sun Yat-Sen University, Guangzhou 510275, China
Jun Chen
Affiliation:
State Key Laboratory for Turbulence and Complex Systems and Department of Mechanics and Engineering Science, College of Engineering, Peking University, Beijing 100871, China
Bo-Fang Liu
Affiliation:
Shanghai Institute of Applied Mathematics and Mechanics and Shanghai Key Laboratory of Mechanics in Energy Engineering, Shanghai University, Shanghai 200072, China
Zhen-Su She
Affiliation:
State Key Laboratory for Turbulence and Complex Systems and Department of Mechanics and Engineering Science, College of Engineering, Peking University, Beijing 100871, China
Jun Zhang
Affiliation:
Courant Institute and Department of Physics, New York University, New York, NY 10012, USA NYU-ECNU Institutes of Mathematical Sciences and Physics Research, NYU-Shanghai, Shanghai 200062, China
Quan Zhou*
Affiliation:
Shanghai Institute of Applied Mathematics and Mechanics and Shanghai Key Laboratory of Mechanics in Energy Engineering, Shanghai University, Shanghai 200072, China
*
†Email address for correspondence: qzhou@shu.edu.cn
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Abstract

Enhancement of heat transport across a fluid layer is of fundamental interest as well as great technological importance. For decades, Rayleigh–Bénard convection has been a paradigm for the study of convective heat transport, and how to improve its overall heat-transfer efficiency is still an open question. Here, we report an experimental and numerical study that reveals a novel mechanism that leads to much enhanced heat transport. When vertical partitions are inserted into a convection cell with thin gaps left open between the partition walls and the cooling/heating plates, it is found that the convective flow becomes self-organized and more coherent, leading to an unprecedented heat-transport enhancement. In particular, our experiments show that with six partition walls inserted, the heat flux can be increased by approximately 30 %. Numerical simulations show a remarkable heat-flux enhancement of up to 2.3 times (with 28 partition walls) that without any partitions.

JFM classification

Turbulent Flows: Turbulent convection Turbulent Flows: Turbulent Flows
Type
Rapids
Information
Journal of Fluid Mechanics , Volume 784 , 10 December 2015 , R5
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Copyright
© 2015 Cambridge University Press 

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Bao et al. supplementary movie

The movie about the onset of flow structures in the convection cell with 20 partition walls at d=2 mm and Ra=1e8 from numerical results. Left panel: The temperature (color) and velocity (arrows) fields. Here, the red and blue colors correspond to the high and low temperature regions, respectively. Right panel: The pressure field (color), where the red and blue colors respectively correspond to the high and low pressure regions.

Download Bao et al. supplementary movie(Video)
Video 31.6 MB

Bao et al. supplementary movie

The movie about the onset of flow structures in the convection cell with 20 partition walls at d=2 mm and Ra=1e8 from numerical results. Left panel: The temperature (color) and velocity (arrows) fields. Here, the red and blue colors correspond to the high and low temperature regions, respectively. Right panel: The pressure field (color), where the red and blue colors respectively correspond to the high and low pressure regions.

Download Bao et al. supplementary movie(Video)
Video 17.4 MB