Thermal conductivity enhancement of Ag nanowires on an organic phase change material

• DOI: 10.1007/s10973-009-0472-y
• Publication Date: 2009-09-15T17:15:40Z
• Authors: J. L. Zeng; Z. Cao; D. W. Yang; L. X. Sun; L. Zhang
• Keywords: 0211 other engineering and technologies; 02 engineering and technology

One of the greatest challenges in the applica- tion of organic phase change materials (PCMs) is to increase their thermal conductivity while maintaining high phase change enthalpy. 1-Tetradecanol/Ag nanowires composite PCM containing 62.73 wt% (about 11.8 vol%) of Ag nanowires showed remarkably high thermal con- ductivity (1.46 W m -1 K -1 ) and reasonably high phase change enthalpy (76.5 J g -1 ). This behavior was attributed to the high aspect ratio of Ag nanowires, few thermal conduct interfaces, and high interface thermal conductivity of Ag nanowires in the composite PCM. These results indicated that Ag nanowires might be strong candidates for thermal conductivity enhancement of organic PCMs.