This award supports Professor Cristina Amon of Carnegie Mellon University (CMU) to collaborate in mechanical engineering research with Professor F. Mayinger of the Institute for Thermodynamics of the Technical University of Munich, Germany. The objective of their research is to quantify and gain a better understanding of the physics of heat transfer enhancement in supercritical, self-sustained, oscillatory flows, such as those found in compact heat exchangers for cooling electronic systems. The numerical and analytical part of their joint research will be developed at CMU under the direction of Professor Amon. The experimental part of the research will be conducted at the Technical University of Munich by Professor Mayinger and others, using real-time holographic interferometry and high-speed cinematography. Heat transfer plays an important role in the reliability and efficiency of a great many mechanical and electronic systems. Optimizing such transfer is being given more and more attention in the design of systems needing compact heat exchange surfaces. These include many applications in energy-related devices, electronic cooling, cryogenics and aerospace applications. The proposed cooperative research will develop and validate a mathematical model of heat transfer enhancement.
