Open Access

ARTICLE

A CRITICAL REVIEW OF RECENT INVESTIGATIONS ON TWO-PHASE PRESSURE DROP IN FLOW BOILING MICRO-CHANNELS

Sira Saisorn^a,b, Somchai Wongwises^b,c,∗

a King Mongkut’s Institute of Technology Ladkrabang Chumphon Campus Chumphon 86160, Thailand
b Fluid Mechanics, Thermal Engineering and Multiphase Flow Research Lab. (FUTURE)
Department of Mechanical Engineering, King Mongkut’s University of Technology Thonburi, Bangmod, Bangkok 10140, Thailand
c The Academy of Science, The Royal Institute of Thailand, Sanam Suea Pa, Dusit, Bangkok 10300, Thailand

* Corresponding Author: E-mail:

Frontiers in Heat and Mass Transfer 2012, 3(1), 1-7. https://doi.org/10.5098/hmt.v3.1.3007

Abstract

Two-phase pressure drop during flow boiling has been studied for several decades. Obviously, the publications available on micro-channels are relatively small compared with those for ordinarily sized channels. Although the use of micro-channels yields several advantages, the pressure drop taking p lace in these extremely small channels is higher than that in the ordinarily sized channels because of the increased wall friction. The knowledge of the two-phase pressure drop characteristics in addition to heat transfer phenomena is essential to the design and evaluation of the micro-systems. In this paper, recent research on the flow boiling pressure drop in micro-scale channels is reviewed. The experimental results as well as the relevant prediction methods based on different researchers are presented.

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Keywords

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