CAREER: Investigation of Nanoscale Radiative Heat Transfer for Enhanced Thermal Infrared Energy Conversion and Cooling

职业：研究纳米级辐射传热以增强热红外能量转换和冷却

• 批准号: 1836967
• 负责人: Yi Zheng
• 金额: $ 50.33万
• 依托单位: University of Rhode Island
• 依托单位国家: 美国
• 项目类别: Standard Grant
• 财政年份: 2019
• 资助国家: 美国
• 起止时间: 2019-06-01 至 2019-09-30
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/showAward?AWD_ID=1836967&HistoricalAwards=false
• 关键词: CAREER; Investigation; Nanoscale; Radiative; Heat

The fascinating nature of nanoengineered materials has opened the door to novel approaches for conducting research in the field of nanoscale energy conversion and cooling technology. This project creates new fundamental knowledge about nanoscale radiative heat transfer, needed to solve pressing problems in energy harnessing, conversion and cooling. The ability to manipulate, suppress and tune the radiative properties of nanoscale objects becomes essential in diverse areas like solar and thermophotovoltaic energy conversion, waste heat recovery, and potential energy savings by radiative cooling. The characterization of low-cost, highly effective thermal nanomaterials is necessary for basic scientific thermal research and industrial production. Given the potential of these technologies, there is a need to attract talent and generate interest in young minds. The project establishes, supports, and nurtures an environment that encourages nanoengineering entrepreneurship and leadership and exposes high school students to small scale heat transfer technologies to get hands-on experience about nanomaterials and solve real-world societal and global energy challenges. Hands-on NanoEngineering workshops are to be conducted in partnership with local high schools to increase the quantity and quality of students, especially minorities and women.This project aims to conduct a comprehensive study relevant to nanoscale radiative thermal transport due to photonic metamaterials in both far-field and near-field regimes. The objective of this project is to better understand the physics of radiative thermal transport at the nanometer scale, focusing mainly on thermal, optical and unique combinations of these properties of nanostructured materials. It includes three research tasks: (1) explore novel nanomaterials using computational methods and advanced spectroscopy techniques, (2) manipulate thermal radiative wavelength selectivity in near-field and far-field regimes, and (3) demonstrate photonic metamaterials-based thermophotovoltaic energy conversion and radiative cooling. The knowledge gap will be closed between nanoscale thermal transport and radiative wavelength selectivity which attributes to the enhanced thermal infrared energy harvesting, conversion, and photon-based cooling, both necessitate exploring interdisciplinary engineering discoveries and approaches when these technologies in the areas of thermal transport processes and nanoengineering are combined to function as an integrative energy system.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.

纳米工程材料的迷人性质为纳米级能量转换和冷却技术领域的研究新方法打开了大门。该项目创造了有关纳米级辐射传热的新基础知识，需要解决能源利用、转换和冷却方面的紧迫问题。操纵、抑制和调节纳米级物体的辐射特性的能力在太阳能和热光伏能源转换、废热回收以及通过辐射冷却实现潜在节能等不同领域变得至关重要。低成本、高效热纳米材料的表征对于基础科学热研究和工业生产是必要的。鉴于这些技术的潜力，需要吸引人才并激发年轻人的兴趣。该项目建立、支持和培育一个鼓励纳米工程创业和领导力的环境，并使高中生接触小规模传热技术，以获得纳米材料的实践经验并解决现实世界的社会和全球能源挑战。将与当地高中合作举办纳米工程实践研讨会，以提高学生的数量和质量，特别是少数族裔和女性学生。该项目旨在开展与光子超材料引起的纳米级辐射热传输相关的全面研究-场和近场制度。该项目的目标是更好地了解纳米尺度的辐射热传输物理学，主要关注纳米结构材料的热、光学和这些特性的独特组合。它包括三个研究任务：（1）利用计算方法和先进的光谱技术探索新型纳米材料，（2）操纵近场和远场区域的热辐射波长选择性，以及（3）演示基于光子超材料的热光伏能量转换和辐射冷却。纳米级热传输和辐射波长选择性之间的知识差距将被缩小，这归因于增强的热红外能量收集、转换和基于光子的冷却，当这些技术在热传输过程领域中时，都需要探索跨学科的工程发现和方法该奖项反映了 NSF 的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的智力优势和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。