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Updated: Jul 11, 2026

Thermal Measurement Techniques in Analytical Microfluidic Devices
Published on: June 3, 2015
Mean-field versus microconvection effects in nanofluid thermal conduction
Jacob Eapen1, Wesley C Williams, Jacopo Buongiorno
1Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, Massachusetts 02139, USA. eapen@lanl.gov
Abstract:
Transient hot-wire data on thermal conductivity of suspensions of silica and perfluorinated particles show agreement with the mean-field theory of Maxwell but not with the recently postulated microconvection mechanism. The influence of interfacial thermal resistance, convective effects at microscales, and the possibility of thermal conductivity enhancements beyond the Maxwell limit are discussed.
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