Heat transfer analysis of thermoelectric driven swirling flow

Xu, Wenyu

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https://hdl.handle.net/2142/42189 Copy

Description

Title

Heat transfer analysis of thermoelectric driven swirling flow

Author(s)

Xu, Wenyu

Issue Date

2013-02-03T19:27:20Z

Director of Research (if dissertation) or Advisor (if thesis)

Ruzic, David N.

Department of Study

Nuclear, Plasma, & Rad Engr

Discipline

Nuclear Engineering

Degree Granting Institution

University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign

Degree Name

M.S.

Degree Level

Thesis

Keyword(s)

• Nuclear fusion
• liquid metal
• lithium
• thermoelectric
• Magnetohydrodynamics (MHD)
• plasma facing component
• divertor

Abstract

As fusion experimental devices progress it has become a challenging problem to remove the intensive heat from the divertor region. The solid plasma facing materials (PFM) suffer from the sputtering and thermal stress. An alternative way is to utilize liquid metal especially the liquid lithium as the divertor material. An experiment on CDX-U found that a shallow pool of liquid lithium could bear 60MW/m2 heat flux without significant evaporation. A swirling flow pattern was observed during the experiment which was firstly believed to be Marangoni effect. To reveal the truth of this flow the Solid/Liquid Lithium Divertor Experiment (SLiDE) was constructed at University of Illinois, Center for Plasma-Material Interactions. SLiDE has similar experimental conditions as CDX-U and in recent experiments thermoelectric magnetohydrodynamics (TEMHD) was proved to be the dominant driven force of this kind of swirling flow. Its fluid properties were fully investigated later and a group of equations have been developed to describe the velocity field. Following the previous work this thesis focuses on the heat transfer analysis of the TEMHD driven swirling flow. An infrared (IR) camera system was installed and calibrated to monitor the surface temperature change under different experimental conditions especially the highly focused heat flux. In addition the 3D dimensionless heat transfer equation is analyzed and simplified for experiment related parameters. A relevant 3D convection heat transfer model was built to calculate the detailed temperature distribution and the results were compared to the IR camera results. Good agreement was achieved under some conditions while some difference generated when the height of the liquid lithium was changed. The changing velocity field in the boundary layer was raised as a possible reason.

Graduation Semester

2012-12

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http://hdl.handle.net/2142/42189

Copyright and License Information

Copyright 2012 Wenyu Xu

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