A Series Circuit of Thermal Rectifiers: An Effective Way to Enhance Rectification Ratio

Shiqian Hu; Meng An; Nuo Yang; Baowen Li

doi:10.1002/smll.201602726

A Series Circuit of Thermal Rectifiers: An Effective Way to Enhance Rectification Ratio

Small. 2017 Feb;13(6). doi: 10.1002/smll.201602726. Epub 2016 Dec 1.

Authors

Shiqian Hu¹, Meng An^{2

3}, Nuo Yang^{2

3}, Baowen Li⁴

Affiliations

¹ Center for Phononics and Thermal Energy Science, School of Physics Science and Engineering, Tongji University, Shanghai, 200092, P. R. China.
² State Key Laboratory of Coal Combustion, Huazhong University of Science and Technology (HUST), Wuhan, 430074, P. R. China.
³ Nano Interface Center for Energy (NICE), School of Energy and Power Engineering, Huazhong University of Science and Technology (HUST), Wuhan, 430074, P. R. China.
⁴ Department of Mechanical Engineering, University of Colorado, Boulder, CO, 80309, USA.

PMID: 27906495
DOI: 10.1002/smll.201602726

Abstract

A novel approachis proposed to enhance the thermal rectification ratio, namely, arranging two thermal rectifiers in series. Through theoretical analysis and molecular dynamics simulations on graphene/phononic crystal structures, the results show that the series thermal rectifiers enhance thermal rectification ratio significantly, compared to a single rectifier. Meanwhile, the results of theoretical prediction match well with simulation results.

Keywords: graphene phononic crystal; series effect; thermal rectification.