Heat Transfer Dynamics in Porous Media

Heat transfer in porous media encompasses the interplay of conduction, convection and, in some cases, radiation within a matrix of solid material interspersed by voids filled with fluid. Such media range from geological formations and packed-bed thermal storage units to catalytic microreactors and advanced insulating materials. At the pore scale, local fluid velocity, tortuous pathways and the interfacial area between solid and fluid phases govern the distribution of temperature and the overall thermal performance. Macroscopically, homogenised models apply Darcy’s law, energy conservation and effective transport coefficients to predict bulk heat flux and temperature fields. Recent advances combine high-resolution imaging with numerical schemes—such as lattice Boltzmann methods, large-eddy simulations and pore-network modelling—to resolve thermal non-equilibrium between solid and fluid phases and to account for anisotropy in permeability and thermal conductivity. Understanding these dynamics underpins the design of efficient energy-storage devices, the optimisation of industrial reactors and the assessment of geothermal reservoirs. Enhanced predictive capability also aids in minimising entropy generation in energy conversion systems and in tailoring porous structures for targeted thermal management applications.

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Heat Transfer Dynamics in Porous Media publication trend

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Technical terms

Porosity: Fraction of the total volume occupied by void spaces through which fluid can flow.

Permeability: Measure of a porous medium’s ability to transmit fluid under an applied pressure gradient.

Local thermal non-equilibrium: Condition in which the solid matrix and the pore-filling fluid maintain distinct temperatures.

Nusselt number: Dimensionless ratio quantifying the enhancement of convective heat transfer over pure conduction.

Darcy’s law: Empirical relation describing the volumetric flow rate through a porous medium as proportional to the pressure gradient and permeability.

References

1. Large eddy simulations of turbulent heat transfer in packed bed energy storage systems. Journal of Energy Storage (2023).
2. Investigation of thermal behavior and performance of different microchannels: A case study for traditional and Manifold Microchannels. Case Studies in Thermal Engineering (2022).
3. Combined heat and mass transfer and thermodynamic irreversibilities in the stagnation-point flow of Casson rheological fluid over a cylinder with catalytic reactions and inside a porous medium under local thermal nonequilibrium. Computers & Mathematics with Applications (2021).