AVS 58th Annual International Symposium and Exhibition
    Advanced Surface Engineering Division Wednesday Sessions
       Session SE+SS-WeM

Invited Paper SE+SS-WeM2
Near-Field Radiation Heat Transfer

Wednesday, November 2, 2011, 8:20 am, Room 104

Session: Surface Engineering for Thermal Management
Presenter: Gang Chen, Massachusetts Institute of Technology
Authors: A. Mavrokefalos, Massachusetts Institute of Technology
P. Sambegoro, Massachusetts Institute of Technology
K. Esfarjani, Massachusetts Institute of Technology
G. Chen, Massachusetts Institute of Technology
Correspondent: Click to Email
Radiation heat transfer in nanostructures can differ significantly from that in macrostructures due to wave effects. Max Planck himself realized that the blackbody radiation law that now bears his name was limited to geometries much larger than wavelength of thermal radiation. Theory has predicted that thermal radiation heat transfer between two surfaces separated by tens of nanometers can exceed that of Planck’s blackbody radiation law by several orders of magnitude. We have designed an experiment measuring near-field radiation heat transfer between a sphere and a flat plat using bi-layer atomic force microscope cantilevers as a heat flux and a temperature sensor. We demonstrated experimentally that near-field radiation heat transfer can exceed Planck’s law prediction by four orders of magnitude, mediated by surface phonon polaritons. We will also show that existing fluctuating electrodynamics theory cannot predict experimental results in the extreme limit of small separation between two surfaces. Our experiments raise interesting question on the convergence of radiation heat transfer mechanism and interfacial heat conduction mechanism. Theoretical approaches bridging these two regimes will be discussed.