MOSCOW, October 30. /TASS/. Researchers of the Siberian Federal University based in Krasnoyarsk have created a mathematical model showing how gravitation changes liquid evaporation. These calculations can help develop systems of liquid cooling aboard the space station and in new-generation satellites, the University’s press office told TASS on Tuesday.
"The staffers of the Siberian Federal University have presented jointly with their colleagues from the Computer Modelling Institute of the Siberian branch of the Russian Academy of Sciences their calculations that describe the structure of stream flows and evaporation processes in the two-layered ‘liquid-vapor’ system," the press office said in a statement.
"The results will be useful in modifying fluid cooling systems of various electronic micro-and mini-devices that are used, among other things, on board the space station and in new-generation satellites," the statement says.
As the press office explained, the scientists have created a mathematical model, which describes convection processes (where substance and energy flows are transferred by streams). Such processes depend on external and internal conditions: the properties of the media (the fluid and ambient gas or the steam gas mixture), the system’s temperature mode, its geometry (for example, the thickness of the channel, in which the liquid and the vapor are located) and the gravitation impact. The researchers focused on describing the effect of the latter two factors.
It turned out that the system where the upper layers are colder than the lower strata is unstable because a convection movement emerges in the gravitational field in this medium: the cold fluid sinks while the hot liquid rises. As the Siberian scientists say, this movement can be ‘governed," for example, by altering the thickness of the liquid’s layer. Thus, the convection process can be suppressed by reducing the height of the fluid’s layer.
Doctor of Physical and Mathematical Sciences, Professor of the Siberian Federal University, Staffer of the Computer Modelling Institute of the Siberian branch of the Russian Academy of Sciences Viktoria Bekezhanova, who is one of the research’s authors, explained that the study of convection processes is important for developments in the sphere of thermal physics, the chemical industry, materials science and bio-medicine.