Aurel Stodola Lecture May 2, 2013

Synergetic Experimental and Computational Methodology
for Interfacial Transport Phenomena

Professor Nobuhide Kasagi

Professor Emeritus, The University of Tokyo

Principal Fellow, CRDS, Japan Science and Technology Agency

One of the prerequisites indispensable for a sustainable energy future is highly efficient energy use and hence drastic reduction of thermodynamic losses in heat and mass transport processes at various scales. These are unavoidable and irreversible losses (i.e., entropy production) due to the non-equilibrium existing at interfaces, but if they can be reduced, this can lead to enormous benefi ts for society through substantial energy savings. In particular, the enhancement of phase-interface transport should be a central technological issue for various thermo-fl uid systems, such as heat engines and fuel cells. In studying various complex transport processes such as convective and boiling heat transfer, fl uidic cell sorting and electrochemical reaction in porous materials, I have always found that working on the two wheels of experimental and computational methods is a powerful driver in research work. As an example, I will fi rst revisit an important classical issue of whether enhancing turbulent heat transfer is possible with friction loss reduced or at least not increased as much as heat transfer in a canonical flow system. I will also introduce the recent progress that has been made in analyzing and designing ion, electron and mass transport in a solid oxide fuel cell electrode. These studies demonstrate that the synergetic methodology should help analyzing in detail and optimally designing multi-scale phase-interface transport for better energy efficiency.