Effects of system pressure on nucleate boiling: Insights from molecular dynamics

HW Hu and Y Lu and L Guo and XN Chen and Q Wang and J Wang and Q Li, JOURNAL OF MOLECULAR LIQUIDS, 402, 124745 (2024).

DOI: 10.1016/j.molliq.2024.124745

Nucleate boiling as one of the most efficient heat dissipation technology is an important technology for aerospace thermal protection. However, the supersonic environment of the spacecraft brings pressure oscillation to the phase change cooling system, which affects the heat transfer efficiency of nucleate boiling. Despite molecular dynamic simulation being an effective tool for studying the microscopic mechanism of boiling, there is still a lack of relevant research on the microscopic mechanism of the influence of pressures on nucleate boiling. Therefore, we have proposed a novel pressure-control method to explore the system pressure effect on nucleate boiling using the molecular dynamics simulation method. The bubble dynamics and interface evolution during nucleate boiling under different system pressures, as well as the energy barrier for nucleation, have been illustrated and quantitatively explored. We expect that the proposed pressure-control method can be conveniently applied in the future boiling studies under complex and varied pressure environments.

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