Carefully engineered metamaterials boost heat transfer between objects by as much as four times, according to a new study.
Led by Carnegie Mellon University, researchers have been able to confirm that heat transfer can be actively designed and enhanced.
At the core of the discovery is a phenomenon called near-field radiative heat transfer. When two objects are brought extremely close together – just a few hundred nanometers apart – heat doesn’t simply radiate away in the usual sense. Instead, it can tunnel across the gap through electromagnetic waves, dramatically increasing how much energy flows between them.
While this effect has been known about for years, scientists haven’t been able to show it experimentally. Using metamaterials, this new study has been able to.
“Unlike conventional materials, metamaterials are built with tiny, repeating patterns that interact with energy in precise ways,” said Sheng Shen, a professor of mechanical engineering at Carnegie Mellon University and senior...