The Role of Surface Structures

The new Gordon Conference (GRC) on "Micro and Nanoscale Phase Change Heat Transfer" will create a new forum to discuss and share recent fundamental advancements in micro and nanoscale phase change processes. In particular, with the recent developments in micro and nanoengineered surfaces, significant efforts have focused on using such structures for boiling, evaporation, and condensation. It is now evident that these structures on surfaces hold great promise to advance liquid-vapor phase change and are key to enable the development of thermal management, energy conversion, and water desalination systems, among others. Accordingly, there has been a significant increase in research efforts in these areas with a notable rise in work reported in recent conferences and journal papers. Yet, new questions and challenges have emerged towards understanding the complexities in phase-change heat transfer with the incorporation of micro and nanostructures due to the interdisciplinary nature of this area. Despite the strong expertise of many researchers, a forum is currently lacking to bring these experts together and have the collective discussions needed to provide the mechanistic insights to ultimately harness these processes and make fundamental breakthroughs.

This new GRC seeks to address these challenges in phase-change heat transfer and realize new opportunities by establishing a cohesive multi-disciplinary community consisting of researchers in heat transfer, chemistry, material science, and interfacial science, among others. The topics of the GRC will focus on the fundamental modes of liquid vapor phase change (boiling, thin film evaporation, and condensation) in combination with surface structures, and the opportunities provided by a new class of experimental heat transfer and metrology methodology, theoretical and numerical thermal science, surface science and chemistry, materials, and flow manipulation. While currently various general conferences in heat transfer exist, the phase change related topics are often interspersed within the large conference program, which do not allow for detailed technical discussions even amongst the heat transfer community. Furthermore, with this topic of research being increasing interdisciplinary, experts from important related areas are not included in these discussions and yet are essential to move the field forward. This GRC will bridge this gap between heat transfer experts with others from important relevant disciplines. In addition, the significant time allotted for discussions within the GRC structure will foster collaborations amongst diverse researchers to rapidly accelerate understanding and provide a unified knowledge base. Young and established researchers in the field alike will be encouraged to participate in the talks and poster sessions, which will enhance the diversity and intellectual capacity. We anticipate that by fostering this multi-disciplinary research community with the GRC, it will become the premier meeting in micro and nanoscale phase change heat transfer.