Comprehensive numerical investigations on the thermal performance of heat recirculating micro combustor with pin fins for micro-thermal voltaic system applications

Aiming at improving the relatively low energy output and energy conversion efficiency of the micro-thermal voltaic (MTPV) system, an innovative heat recirculating micro combustor with pin fins is designed. The effects of pin fins arrangement, hydrogen/air equivalent ratio on the energy output and performance of CHMC, HMCP and HMCI are compared and investigated. The result shows that when the V_in is 6 m/s and Φ is 1.0, the emitter power of CHMC is 72.76W, and that of HCMP and HCMI micro combustor are 75.99W and 76.35W. and the emitter efficiency of CHMC, HCMP and HCMI is 41.93%, 43.26% and 44.01%. HMCI has better energy output capability compared with CHMC and HMCP. Even though, HMCI brings a higher pressure drop, it is within the acceptable range. When the V_in is 6 m/s, the pressure drop from the pin fins only accounts for 26.4% of the total pressure drop for HMCI. Through the study of equivalent ratio, it is found that HMCI has good adaptability in different equivalent ratio range. This work provides new ideas for the development of MTPV system in the future.     

Numerical study on methane/air combustion characteristics in a heat-recirculating micro combustor embedded with porous media

Micro-combustor is a portable power device that can provide energy efficiently, heat recirculating is considered to be an important factor affecting the combustion process. For enhancing the heat recirculating and improving the combustion stability, we proposed a heat-recirculating micro-combustor embedded with porous media, and the numerical simulation was carried out by CFD software. In this paper, the effect of porous media materials, thickness and inlet conditions (equivalence ratio, inlet velocity) on the temperature distribution and exhaust species in the micro combustor are investigated. The results showed that compared with the micro combustor without embedded porous media (MCNPM), micro-combustor embedded with porous media (MCEPM) can improve the temperature uniformity distribution in the radial direction and strengthen the preheating capacity. However, it is found that the embedding thickness of porous media should be reasonably arranged. Setting the thickness of porous media to 15 mm, the combustor can obtain excellent comprehensive capacity of steady combustion and heat recirculating. Compared the thermal performance of Al₂O₃, SiC, and ZrO₂ porous media materials, indicating that SiC due to its strong thermal conductivity, its combustion stabilization and heat recirculating capacity are obviously better than that of Al₂O₃ and ZrO₂. With the porous media embedded in the micro combustor, the combustion has a tempering limit of more than 10 m/s, and the flame is blown out of the porous media area over 100 m/s. The reasonable equivalence ratio of CH₄/air combustion should be controlled within the range of 0.1–0.5, and “super-enthalpy combustion” can be realized.     

Contact temperatures and their influence on wear during pin-on-disk tribotesting

It is important to take contact temperatures into account when developing friction and wear tests for potential tribomaterials and when analyzing the results of those tests. This paper presents some of the most useful analytical and numerical methods that can be used to predict surface temperature rises in dry or boundary lubricated pin-on-disk tribotests. The objective is the development of relatively simple, accurate, and easy-to-use expressions that can be used to predict contact temperatures in pin-on-disk sliding contacts. Results of the methods are compared for several different cases, and experimental verification of the predictions are also presented. The resulting expressions are applied to investigate wear of a ceramic (zirconia), metal (stainless steel) and polymer (polyethylene) in pin-on-disk tests.     

Calculations of optical properties in p-doped nitrides quaternary alloys multiple quantum wells

We present theoretical photoluminescence (PL) and absorption spectra of p-doped InGaN/AlInGaN and AlInGaN/InGaN multiple quantum wells (MQWs). The calculations were performed within the k.p method by means of solving a full eight-band Kane Hamiltonian together with the Poisson equation in a plane wave representation, including exchange–correlation effects within the local density approximation. Strain effects due to the lattice mismatch and an internal electric field are also taken into account. We show that by changing the In and Al composition we can reach short and long emission wavelengths. The trends in the calculated Stokes shift, due to many-body effects within the quasi-two-dimensional hole gas (2DHG), are analyzed as a function of the acceptor doping concentration. Since the studies of optical properties of quantum wells based on nitrides quaternary alloys are at an early stage, the results reported here will provide guidelines for the interpretation of forthcoming experiments.     

Experimental study of advanced cogeneration system with ammonia–water mixture cycles at bottoming

In this study, an advanced cogeneration system (ACGS) composed of three turbine systems and an ammonia absorption refrigerator is presented. The overall system configurations and some experimental results of the steady state are shown. The effectiveness of the bottoming stage that employs an ammonia–water mixture (AWM) as the working fluid is confirmed by experimental investigation. The experimental investigation shows that the AWM bottoming power-refrigeration cycles contributes to a higher bottoming efficiency, which is about 7.0% in electric power. Otherwise, the efficiency at the middle stage in conventional combined gas and steam turbine power plants is 4.6%. The cogeneration efficiency at the bottoming reached about 26.5% which is the heat and power ratio to the heat input from the heat recovery steam generator.     

Remarks on different reviews of Chinese character recognition

This paper gives an introduction and remarks on two review papers for Chinese character recognition. One review is made by Chinese authors, another is from American scientists. They investigate Chinese character from different language environments; they do the research from different points of view. Thus, a more comprehensive view on Chinese character recognition, which is an important branch of pattern recognition, can be provided to the readers. Meantime, one article pays attention to online process, and other paper deals with offline recognition, which complement each other. The author is the Associate Editor-in-Chief of Frontiers of Computer Science in China     

Flame inertia into lean region in stratified hydrogen mixture

In hydrogen engines, the direct-injection stratified charge system has the ability to realize a more lean operation than homogeneous charge systems. Flame propagation into the lean region in the stratified hydrogen mixture was investigated in this study. Hydrogen was injected into a lean hydrogen–air premixed mixture charge of the equivalence ratio of 0.074–0.257. This stratified hydrogen mixture was ignited by an electric spark. The flame generated in the hydrogen jet propagated into the lean premixed mixture charge as if it had “inertia”, even though the stoichiometry of the premixed mixture charge was less than the lower flammability limit. The amount of burned hydrogen in the case of a stratified mixture was greater than that in the case of the homogeneous mixture. The flame seems to be supported from behind by the burned gas in the rich region until the decay of this support.