Thermodiffusion is one of the mechanisms in transport phenomena in which molecules are transported in a multicomponent mixture driven by temperature gradients. Thermodiffusion in associating mixtures presents a larger degree of complexity than non-associating mixtures, since the direction of flow in associating mixtures may change with variations in composition and temperature. In this study a new activation energy model is proposed for predicting the ratio of evaporation energy to activation energy. The new model has been implemented for prediction of thermodiffusion for acetone-water, ethanol-water and isopropanol-water mixtures. In particular, a sign change in the thermodiffusion factor for associating mixtures has been predicted, which is a major step forward in modeling of thermodiffusion for associating mixtures. In addition, a new model for the prediction of thermodiffusion coefficients for linear chain hydrocarbon binary mixtures is proposed using the theory of irreversible thermodynamics and a kinetics approach. The model predicts the net amount of heat transported based on an available volume for each molecule. This model has been found to be the most reliable and represents a significant improvement over the earlier models. Also a new approach to predicting the Soret coefficient in binary mixtures of linear chain and aromatic hydrocarbons using the thermodynamics of irreversible processes is presented. This approach is based on a free volume theory which explains the diffusivity in diffusion-limited systems. The proposed model combined with the Shukla and Firoozabadi model has been applied to predict the Soret coefficient for binary mixtures of toluene and n-hexane, and benzene and n-heptane. Comparisons of theoretical results with experimental data show a good agreement. The proposed model has also been applied to estimate thermodiffusion coefficients of binary mixtures of n-butane & carbon dioxide and n-dodecane & carbon dioxide at different temperature. The results have also been incorporated into CFD software FLUENT for 3-dimensional simulations of thermodiffusion and convection in porous media. The predictions show the thermodiffuison phenomenon is dominant at low permeabilities (0.0001 to 0.01), but as the permeability increases convection plays an important role in establishing a concentration distribution. Finally, the activation energy in Eyring’s viscosity theory is examined for associating mixtures. Several methods are used to estimate the activation energy of pure components and then extended to mixtures of linear hydrocarbon chains. The activation energy model based on alternative forms of Eyring’s viscosity theory is implemented to estimate the thermodiffusion coefficient for hydrocarbon binary mixtures. Comparisons of theoretical results with the available thermodiffusion coefficient data have shown a good performance of the activation energy model.

Natural convection with high cooling effects is of increasing interest in cold region geotechnical engineering. To study natural air convection in a highly-permeable porous medium, convective and conductive heat transfer experiments were carried out using an insulated cylindrical tank filled with styrofoam chips. Convection and conduction were caused by controlling the temperatures at the top and bottom of the tank, and a series of cross-sectional conductive and convective isotherms were generated from collected temperature data. Additional convective patterns were obtained from tests by centrally localized heating below or cooling above. Flow velocities were measured at the center of the tank. Results showed that convective heat transfer rate was higher than thermal conduction. Convective isothermal patterns varied with various boundary conditions and could be influenced by small temperature perturbation. Given appropriate environmental conditions, efficient convective cooling effects can be used to enhance ground freezing or to protect permafrost from degradation. / Geotechnical Engineering

Distributions of air pollutants and their precursors in the troposphere are driven largely by meteorological conditions (e.g., wind, cloud convection, lightning, and precipitation) and emissions such as those of NOx from anthropogenic sources (e.g., fossil fuel combustion) and natural sources (e.g., soils and lightning). As the most polluted regions in the world, North America and East Asia significantly contribute to climate change on both regional and global scales. Therefore, it deserves to investigate the vertical and horizontal distributions of the air pollutants in the troposphere over these two regions to better quantify the interaction between air pollution and climate change, which remains until now largely uninvestigated. Here, a Regional chEmical trAnsport Model (REAM) was developed and applied to examine the uncertainties in modeling the effect of convective transport and lightning NOx production on upper tropospheric chemical tracer distributions over North America, and to identify the features of air pollutions over East Asia.

A parallel numerical method has been implemented for solving the Navier Stokes equations on Cartesian and non-orthogonal meshes. To ensure the accuracy of the code first, second and third order differencing schemes, with and without flux-limiters, have been implemented and tested. The most computationally expensive task in the code is the solution of linear equations, and a number of linear solvers have been tested to determine the most efficient. Krylov space, incomplete factorisation, and other iterative and direct solvers from the literature have been implemented, and have been compared with a novel black-box multigrid linear solver that has been developed both as a solver and as a preconditioner for the Krylov space methods. To further reduce execution time the code was parallelised, after a series of experiments comparing the suitability of different parallelisation techniques and computer architectures for the Navier Stokes solver. The code has been applied to the solution of two classes of problem. Two natural convection flows were studied, with an initial study of two dimensional Rayleigh Benard convection being followed by a study of a transient three dimensional flow, in both cases the results being compared with experiment. The second class of problems modelled were free surface flows. A two dimensional free surface driven cavity, and a two dimensional flume flow were modelled, the latter being compared with analytic theory. Finally a three dimensional ship flow was modelled, with the flow about a Wigley hull being simulated for a range of Reynolds and Froude numbers.

The air gap method is a modification of the common way of building indoor walls and floors. The aim of the method is to make a construction, less fragile to water damage, with air gaps where moisture can be removed with a thermally driven air flow, caused by a heating cable. The thesis includes a number of experimental studies of this method. Temperature and convective air flow in a vertical air gap was studied and it was noted how air flow increased with raised power of the heating cable. The air flow for one meter of wall varied between 50 m3/day (13 air changes per hour) and 140 m3/day (36 air changes per hour). The lower value was caused by a temperature difference in the range 0.2-0.3 oC. Without heating no air flow was found. In studies of moisture and RH in wet “slab on ground” constructions, it was noted how the slab in the room with the air gap method dried to a much higher extent than the slab in the room built in an ordinary way. It was also noted that moisture was transported from the air gap in the floor and up through the air gap in the wall. In the room with the air gap construction, the RH values beneath the floor was at a lower level (and below 75 % RH) than the RH values beneath the floor of conventional construction. Mould does not grow below 75 % RH. In the study of a flooded intermediate floor it was noted how the thermally driven convective air flow evidently speeded up drying of the construction. Mould growth was only noted in the case where the heating cables were turned off. / Spaltmetoden är en modifiering av det reguljära sättet av att bygga innerväggar och bjälklag. Syftet med metoden är att skapa en byggnadskonstruktion som är mindre skör med avseende på fuktskador. Detta görs med spalter där fukt kan avlägsnas genom ett termiskt drivet luftflöde som orsakas av en värmekabel. Denna avhandling innehåller ett antal experimentella studier på metoden. Spaltmetoden har studerats med avseende på 1. Samband mellan temperatur och luftflöde, 2. Uttorkning och RF nivåer i golvkonstruktioner samt 3. Översvämning av ett mellanbjälklag 1. Samband mellan temperatur och luftflöde Temperatur och konvektivt luftflöde har studerats i en vertikal spalt och resultatet visar att luftflödet ökar med ökad effekt hos värmekabeln. Luftflödet i en vägg med en meters bredd varierade mellan 50 kubikmeter/dag (13 luftväxlingar per timme) och 140 kubikmeter/dag (36 luftväxlingar per timme). Det lägre flödet orsakades av en temperaturskillnad på 0,2-0,3 oC mellan luftspalt och rum. När värmekabeln var avstängd så registrerades inget luftflöde. 2. Uttorkning och RF nivåer i golvkonstruktioner ovan betongplatta Detta experiment visade att fukt har transporterats från spalten i golvet genom spalten i väggen ut i rumsluften. I spaltkonstruktion var RF inuti golvkonstruktionen lägre (och understeg 75 % RF), jämfört med den konventionella konstruktionen, (mögel växer inte under 75 % RF). Det har också registrerats att betongplattan som hörde till spaltmetoden torkade ut snabbare än betongplattan som var inbyggd i ett gängse rum. 3. Översvämning av ett mellanbjälklag I studien där ett mellanbjälklag blev översvämmat noterades att spaltmetoden förkortade torktiden från 21 dagar till 13 vid den fuktigaste mätpunkten. Mögelväxt noterades endast då värmekabeln hade varit frånslagen. / QC 20101101

Thesis (Ph.D.)--University of Wollongong, 2005. / Typescript. Includes bibliographical references: leaf 232-245.

Thesis (M.S.)--Oregon State University, 2009. / Printout. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 57-58). Also available on the World Wide Web.

Thesis (M.S.)--Florida State University, 2005. / Advisor: Dr. Xiaolei Zou, Florida State University, College of Arts and Sciences, Dept. of Meteorology. Title and description from dissertation home page (viewed June 10, 2005). Document formatted into pages; contains xiii, 112 pages. Includes bibliographical references.

Thesis (M. Sc.)--Wageningen University, 2001. / "July 2001." Includes bibliographical references (p. 47-49). Also available via the World Wide Web. http://www.geocities.com/gjsteeneveld

Thesis (M.S.)--University of Missouri-Columbia, 2004. / Typescript. Vita. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 33-35). Also available on the Internet.