Studying the synergistic roles of nanostructures on the rapid boiling process using molecular dynamics simulation

In this work, the rapid boiling heat transfer over an integrated surface with cavities and pillars at nanoscale is investigated using molecular dynamics simulations. To elucidate the roles of cavities and pillar when they are combinedly integrated with a surface, the comparisons of the results have been made with those obtained on surface with only cavities, surface with only pillars and smooth surface. The results show that surface with only cavities reduce the bubble nucleation time as compared to smooth surface. On the other hand, the surface with only pillars offers higher argon temperature and evaporation rate near liquid cluster detachment from solid surface than surface with cavities and smooth surface. The bubble nucleation is explained by the contest of average kinetic and potential energies of liquid atoms. For surfaces with cavities and pillars, the total energy of atoms in the vicinity of nanostructures becomes greater than zero faster than smooth surface leading to early bubble nucleation, and bubble nucleation tends to start from the vicinity of nanostructures. Furthermore, the integrated surface takes the advantage of both cavity and pillar, and as a result it has lowest bubble nucleation time and higher evaporation rate and heat flux than other surfaces. © 2022 Taylor & Francis Group, LLC