Graphene-Based Functional Coatings for Pool Boiling Heat Transfer Enhancements

Abstract

Pool boiling heat transfer has proven to be the most effective ways to dissipate the large amount of heat fluxes and achieve the efficient cooling in many industrial applications including high-power electronics cooling, data center cooling, heat exchangers, batteries, refrigeration, and air conditioning. With the aggressive net-zero carbon footprint goals set up by the numerous industries across the globe, the need for development of innovative two-phase cooling solutions is of utmost importance. Graphene, being the highest thermal conductivity material, has been implemented in numerous studies for improving both the critical heat flux (maximum possible heat removed before thermal runaway of the heater surface) and a heat transfer coefficient (determines how efficiently the heat is removed) in pool boiling heat transfer. Initially, this chapter introduces various graphene-based nanomaterials and basics related to structure and characterization of graphene. Later, the highlights of some of the notable research work related to the graphene-based coatings for pool boiling enhancements are discussed. The responsible mechanism for such higher performance is summarized. Concluding remarks and industrial applicability of these techniques are also discussed in this section.