From Microscale Phase Change Phenomena to Sustainable Thermal Systems
Srinivas Garimella, Hightower Chair in Engineering, Professor and Director, Sustainable Thermal Systems Laboratory, Georgia Institute of Technology, Atlanta
18th September, 2017, 4.00 pm, Monday, Seminar Hall, Dept of Chemical Engineering
ABSTRACT
Advances in the understanding of phase-change heat and mass transfer in single- and multi-constituent fluids are enabling the development of compact thermal systems that not only harvest low-grade heat, but also upgrade it to produce power, cooling, and other end uses. Such novel thermal systems allow cascading of primary energy utilization over several end uses across the temperature spectrum such that waste heat is minimized to the thermodynamically unavoidable levels. Representative approaches to exploit the advantages of microscale heat and mass transfer not only in small-scale devices, but also to conditioning, waste heat recovery, carbon capture, natural gas cleaning, power plant condenser cooling, water purification, modular nuclear reactors, and portable cooling for the military and other hazardous duty applications will be presented. The talk will demonstrate that application of these insights into phase-change heat and mass transfer can have a significant impact on the supply, demand and intermediate stages of the energy pathway.
ABOUT THE SPEAKER
Dr. Srinivas Garimella is the Hightower Chair in Engineering and Director of the Sustainable Thermal Systems Laboratory at Georgia Institute of Technology. He received M. S. and Ph.D. degrees from The Ohio State University, and a Bachelor’s degree from the Indian Institute of Technology, Kanpur. He has held prior positions as Research Scientist at Battelle Memorial Institute, Senior Engineer at General Motors Corp., and Associate Professor at Western Michigan University and Iowa State University. He is a Fellow of the American Society of Mechanical Engineers, past Associate Editor of the ASME Journal of Heat Transfer, and Editor of the International Journal of Air-conditioning and Refrigeration. He has also served as Associate Editor of the ASME Journal of Energy Resources Technology, and Past Chair of the Advanced Energy Systems Division of ASME. He was an Associate Editor of the ASHRAE HVAC&R Research Journal and Chair of the ASHRAE Technical Committee on Absorption and Heat Operated Machines, and was on the ASHRAE Research Administration Committee. He held the William and Virginia Binger Associate Professorship of Mechanical Engineering at ISU from 1999-2001. He has mentored over 75 postdoctoral researchers, research engineers and students pursuing their M.S. and Ph.D. degrees, with his research resulting in over 250 archival journal and conference publications, a textbook on Heat Transfer and Fluid Flow in Minichannels and Microchannels (2nd Ed., Elsevier 2014), and a book on Condensation Heat Transfer (World Scientific Publishing, 2015.) He has been awarded eight patents. He is the recipient of the NSF CAREER Award (1999), the ASHRAE New Investigator Award (1998), the SAE Ralph E. Teetor Educational Award for Engineering Educators (1998), and was the Iowa State University Miller Faculty Fellow (1999-2000) and Woodruff Faculty Fellow (2003-2008) at Georgia Tech. He received the ASME Award for Outstanding Research Contributions in the Field of Two-Phase Flow and Condensation in Microchannels, 2012. He also received the Thomas French Distinguished Educator Achievement Award (2008) from The Ohio State University, and the Zeigler Outstanding Educator Award (2012) at Georgia Tech.