Thermodynamics referring to heat transfer is a key concept in energy transport, conversion, conservation, and management with many applications, for example, in heat exchangers, thermal energy storage systems, gas turbines, aerospace, and human physiology. Thermodynamic analysis is essential for the many fields in physics, chemistry, chemical engineering, aerospace engineering, mechanical engineering, cell biology, biomedical engineering, and materials science. Its analytical methods have found fruitful applications in other fields such as economics. Heat transfer is concerned with the generation, use, conversion, and exchange of thermal energy between physical systems and is normally classified under thermal conduction, convection, radiation, and phase change energy transfer. In most cases, it is very difficult to obtain analytical solutions to thermodynamic and heat transfer problems, and numerical modeling and analysis are becoming a powerful tool in these and related areas. A large number of analytical and computational techniques have been developed for modeling and analyzing thermodynamic systems and heat transfer processes. A great amount of the literature has been published, but perhaps a greater quantity remains classified and not readily accessible from industrial research in this important discipline.
The main goal of this special issue is to bring together theoretical, numerical, and experimental contributions that describe original research results and/or innovative concepts that address all aspects of thermodynamics and heat transfer problems. This issue covers a wide range of topics in thermodynamics, fluid mechanics, and heat transfer as well as advanced computing or optimization methods for thermofluid engineering problems in energy and power fields such as turbomachinery, heat exchangers, chemical reactions, and thermal protection systems. We hope that these topics can be pursued and presented yearly to feature trends and new developments.
Acknowledgments
Finally, we would like to express our thanks to all the contributors of this special issue for their support and cooperation and to the qualified reviewers that ensured high paper quality for this special issue.
Gongnan Xie
Christopher G. Jesudason
Di Zhang
Hao-Chun Zhang
John C. Chai