Thermal diffusivity measurement based on evaporative cryocooling excitation: Theory and experiments

Fuente: arXiv
Enregistré dans:
Détails bibliographiques
Auteurs principaux: Zhu, Pengfei, Zhang, Hai, Sfarra, Stefano, Sarasini, Fabrizio, Ibarra-Castanedo, Clemente, Maldague, Xavier, Mandelis, Andreas
Format: Preprint
Publié: 2025
Sujets:
Accès en ligne:
Tags: Ajouter un tag
Pas de tags, Soyez le premier à ajouter un tag!
_version_ 1866914063816065024
author Zhu, Pengfei
Zhang, Hai
Sfarra, Stefano
Sarasini, Fabrizio
Ibarra-Castanedo, Clemente
Maldague, Xavier
Mandelis, Andreas
author_facet Zhu, Pengfei
Zhang, Hai
Sfarra, Stefano
Sarasini, Fabrizio
Ibarra-Castanedo, Clemente
Maldague, Xavier
Mandelis, Andreas
contents Photo-thermal methods for measuring thermal diffusivity inherently pose an ill-posed inverse problem, affected by factors such as sample thickness, heating or cooling time, and excitation energy. Measurement accuracy becomes particularly challenging under non-impulsive pulsed excitation when the observation timescale is comparable to the pulse duration. This is often due to poorly defined pulse shapes, broadened thermal responses, and the absence of clear boundary conditions, especially under significant interfacial temperature gradients where natural convection dominates. The classic Parker solution, while widely used, is physically unrealistic as it assumes adiabatic heat flux and shallow-region heat absorption. In this study, we prove that Parker's assumption is equivalent to the Dirac pulse boundary condition in mathematics. Then, we present comprehensive analytical solutions for thermal/cooling responses under Dirac and rectangular pulse excitations. By comparing with eigenfunction-based solutions for well-posed boundary conditions, we show that Parker's solution is only valid before the thermal peak. Through dimensionless processing, we further demonstrate that Parker's solution can be regarded as a limiting case of the rectangular pulse solution as the heating duration approaches zero. Furthermore, we propose a novel excitation approach, evaporative cryocooling, for thermal diffusivity measurement. This method offers a compact, low-cost, and easy-to-implement alternative to conventional excitation schemes. The theoretical model was further validated through comparison with experimental results.
format Preprint
id arxiv_https___arxiv_org_abs_2509_04263
institution arXiv
publishDate 2025
record_format arxiv
spellingShingle Thermal diffusivity measurement based on evaporative cryocooling excitation: Theory and experiments
Zhu, Pengfei
Zhang, Hai
Sfarra, Stefano
Sarasini, Fabrizio
Ibarra-Castanedo, Clemente
Maldague, Xavier
Mandelis, Andreas
Applied Physics
Photo-thermal methods for measuring thermal diffusivity inherently pose an ill-posed inverse problem, affected by factors such as sample thickness, heating or cooling time, and excitation energy. Measurement accuracy becomes particularly challenging under non-impulsive pulsed excitation when the observation timescale is comparable to the pulse duration. This is often due to poorly defined pulse shapes, broadened thermal responses, and the absence of clear boundary conditions, especially under significant interfacial temperature gradients where natural convection dominates. The classic Parker solution, while widely used, is physically unrealistic as it assumes adiabatic heat flux and shallow-region heat absorption. In this study, we prove that Parker's assumption is equivalent to the Dirac pulse boundary condition in mathematics. Then, we present comprehensive analytical solutions for thermal/cooling responses under Dirac and rectangular pulse excitations. By comparing with eigenfunction-based solutions for well-posed boundary conditions, we show that Parker's solution is only valid before the thermal peak. Through dimensionless processing, we further demonstrate that Parker's solution can be regarded as a limiting case of the rectangular pulse solution as the heating duration approaches zero. Furthermore, we propose a novel excitation approach, evaporative cryocooling, for thermal diffusivity measurement. This method offers a compact, low-cost, and easy-to-implement alternative to conventional excitation schemes. The theoretical model was further validated through comparison with experimental results.
title Thermal diffusivity measurement based on evaporative cryocooling excitation: Theory and experiments
topic Applied Physics
url https://arxiv.org/abs/2509.04263