Kobe University announced that the group in which Associate Professor Asano of the Graduate School of Engineering of the same university participates has started the boiling and two-phase flow experiment at the International Space Station as a project of JAXA (Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency) for the first time in the world. bottom.
In recent years, high-performance cooling and heat transport systems have become necessary due to the sophistication and size of space structures.In particular, cooling using boiling, which is widely used in power generation systems and air conditioners on the earth, can take away a lot of heat from the heat of vaporization and transport it, which makes it possible to make the cooling system compact and save power. , Is expected as an important elemental technology to be applied to future spacecraft.However, since buoyancy does not work in zero gravity outer space, it is said that the bubbles generated by boiling grow large without moving and hinder cooling.
In this project "Two-Phase Flow (TPF) mission", the world's first boiling and two-phase flow experiments were conducted at the International Space Station "Kibo", which can obtain a stable weightless environment, and the gas-liquid interface structure under zero gravity. Aim to clarify the ease of heat transfer.
The results obtained will lead to the realization of an innovative cooling system in a zero gravity space, and are expected to be applied to automobile motors and electric power equipment cooling systems whose acceleration changes significantly even on the ground.
