Heat Flow Between Parallel Plates

Abstract

A study is made of the flow of heat between parallel plates of slightly different temperatures. The problem is described by the linearized Boltzmann equation which is subject to microscopic boundary conditions. We approximate the distribution function by half-range polynomials in velocity space and determine the space-dependent coefficients by forming half-range moment equations. An approximation involving four pairs of space functions suffices to give an accurate treatment of the heat flow and of the density and temperature profiles for the entire range of conditions from free molecule to hydrodynamic. Detailed numerical results for the temperature slip and molecular boundary structure are obtained for hard-sphere molecules. The accuracy of cruder half-range approximations and other methods of fixing the coefficients is established.