Honors College Theses

Publication Date

2016

Major

Mechanical Engineering (B.S.)

Document Type and Release Option

Thesis (open access)

Faculty Mentor

Dr. David Calamas

Abstract

Fractal-like branching channel networks have been shown to offer the advantages of reduced pumping power and lower maximum wall temperatures when employed in the design of microscale heat sinks. Unfortunately, previous literature has been limited to microscale flow networks. In this paper, a microscale flow network will be scaled up to result in a mesoscale flow network and a macroscale flow network. In order to compare the pressure drop across the flow networks of varying scales the results will be nondimensionalized in the form of the Euler number. For a laminar inlet Reynolds number the microscale, mesoscale, and macroscale fractal-like flow networks result in both qualitatively and quantitatively similar Euler number distributions. This suggests that results obtained when studying flow behavior at microscale can be used at larger scales.

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