energies

Article
A Novel Approach for Flow Analysis in Pulsating Heat Pipes:
Cross-Correlation of Local Heat Flux
Naoko Iwata, Fabio Bozzoli *, Luca Pagliarini , Luca Cattani , Matteo Malavasi and Sara Rainieri

Department of Architecture and Engineering, University of Parma, Parco Area Delle Scienze 181/A,
43124 Parma, Italy
* Correspondence: [email protected]

Abstract: Pulsating heat pipe is a promising two-phase heat transfer device that has many advantages
such as a simple wickless structure and high thermal performance. Its thermal behavior is inherently
time-dependent, and it can also be characterized by substantial spatial variations. However, there
are few studies investigating the interaction or similarity of the local physical quantities, such as
heat fluxes exchanged between the working fluid and the device wall in adjacent branches. In the
present work, a new approach based on the application of cross-correlation analysis to local heat
fluxes is proposed to deepen the understanding of the flow characteristics in pulsating heat pipes.
The temperature distribution in the condenser of a seven-turn pulsating heat pipe was measured
with an infrared camera, changing the power input. The local heat flux distributions were estimated
by solving the inverse heat conduction problem in the tube wall. The cross-correlation of the heat
fluxes at different positions of central and edge tubes in the condenser was analyzed. The result
revealed the different trends in the cross-correlation depending on the power input: there were no
clear cross-correlations in 0.5 W, while it was shown more clearly on the diagonal line with increasing
power input to 2 W and 3.5 W because of the more activated flow throughout the heat pipe than that
of the low power input. Moreover, the results of 3.5 W indicated a synchronized flow. It is suggested
that the original approach presented in this work would lead to a deeper understanding of the chaotic
Citation: Iwata, N.; Bozzoli, F.;
fluid oscillation in pulsating heat pipes.
Pagliarini, L.; Cattani, L.; Malavasi,
M.; Rainieri, S. A Novel Approach for
Flow Analysis in Pulsating Heat
Keywords: pulsating heat pipes; infrared analysis; fluid oscillation
Pipes: Cross-Correlation of Local
Heat Flux. Energies 2022, 15, 8664.
https://doi.org/10.3390/en15228664
1. Introduction
Academic Editor: Abu-Siada Ahmed
Improving microprocessor operation has traditionally been complemented by rising
Received: 19 October 2022 power and enhancing on-chip power density, representing a thermal management chal-
Accepted: 15 November 2022 lenge [1]. An elevated working temperature degrades the consistency and performance of
Published: 18 November 2022 electronic devices, and eventually causes catastrophic failures. Therefore, efficient thermal
Publisher’s Note: MDPI stays neutral management is crucial to dissipating heat and avoiding heat-induced failures. According
with regard to jurisdictional claims in to Moore and Shi [2], the overall reliability of electronics is determined by the hottest
published maps and institutional affil- region on the die rather than the average die temperature. Thus, it is essential to spread or
iations. remove the heat from heat-generating areas to prevent hot spot formation. The importance
of thermal management has also been recognized for lithium-ion batteries [3–6], which
are widely used in automobiles and other electronic devices, due to the relatively narrow
allowable temperature range [3,4] and the risk of thermal runaway, where the battery
Copyright: © 2022 by the authors. becomes uncontrollably and extremely hot [5]. The basic strategy of a battery’s thermal
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management is to effectively remove the heat generated by the battery itself [6].
This article is an open access article
Cooling the heat-generating chips or batteries directly by air or liquid can be the
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simplest and most effective way to remove heat, but it requires particular layouts for
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electronics or electric vehicles that are sometimes not feasible. In such cases, heat transfer
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devices that efficiently transport heat from the heat-generating part to the cooled part are
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useful. Among heat transfer devices, the heat pipe [7] is a highly effective passive device for
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Energies 2022, 15, 8664. https://doi.org/10.3390/en15228664 https://www.mdpi.com/journal/energies

Energies 2022, 15, 8664 2 of 15

heat transport at high rates over considerable distances with extremely small temperature
drops, simple construction, and easy control with no external pumping power [8]. Heat
pipes are widely used for computers [8], energy systems including batteries [9,10], and
satellites [11].
Even after heat pipes were widely spread to real applications, novel heat pipes were
invented and developed to overcome the disadvantages of classical heat pipes such as the
inefficient gravity-independent functioning of some commercial wicks and low-flexibility,
and to enhance heat transport performance [8,12]. Pulsating heat pipe (PHP) is one of the
latest “evolved” heat pipes. One of the most attractive characteristics of PHP is its wickless
structure: PHP consists of a capillary tube or channel which is repeatedly bent between
a heated section (i.e., evaporator) and cooled section (i.e., condenser). A working fluid
is charged into the PHP, and it exists as an alternation of vapor and liquid. Once heat
is applied to the evaporator section, the self-excited oscillation of fluid occurs between
the evaporator and the condenser, leading to heat transport and consequent dissipation
at the heat sink. In addition to its simple, cheap, and flexible structure, the PHP is able
to work against and even without gravity [13]. All these features have been considered
as highly appealing by the scientific community since the PHP first conceptualization in
1990s [14,15], and the works dealing with the study of such heat transfer device have been
growing exponentially, especially during the last decade [16,17].
Since PHP has many parameters that affect its heat transfer performance, large number
of experimental investigations has been devoted to the study of its influencing parameters.
The inner diameter should be small enough so that the surface tension overcomes the
gravity and slug/plug flows are induced, however, several studies [18,19] reported that a
larger inner diameter within the critical diameter range results in more heat transferred.
Increasing the number of turns also enhances the heat transfer performance [20]. The
thermophysical properties of working fluid is also important: fluid with low-viscosity, high
thermal conductivity, and high partial derivative of pressure with respect to temperature at
saturation state is preferable in general for better performance [16,21,22].
PHP industrial applications have been also explored [23–25]. Miyazaki [23] proposed
a laptop computer where PHP was embedded and could withstand repeated opening and
closing. Khandekar et al. [24] suggested a heat exchanger constructed of PHP for waste
heat recovery. Rittidech and Wannapakne [25] demonstrated the effectiveness of a solar
collector consisted of a PHP and a water tank for solar water heating system and showed
that cumulative collect efficiency of 62%.
Despite the above attractive propositions, PHP has not yet been widely used in the real
applications and still been studied in the laboratory-scale. This is due to the fact that the
governing principles of thermo-fluid dynamics are still not fully understood and the lack
of design tools caused by this. The thermal behavior of PHP is inherently time-dependent,
and it is also usually characterized by substantial spatial variations. However, so far, in
almost all the studies, PHP heat transfer capability is assessed by carrying out a thermal
characterization based on the quantification of the PHP overall thermal resistance as a
function of the power input provided to the evaporator, which is not enough to investigate
PHP′ s complex thermofluidic behavior, particularly at microscopic scale.
Several recent studies proposed new approaches to investigate the local thermofluidic
behavior. Cattani et al. [26] proposed to apply temperature maps measured by an infrared
(IR) camera to estimate the local heat flux exchanged among the pipe surface and fluid by
means of the Inverse Heat Conduction Problem (IHCP) solution methodology. Pagliarini
et al. [27] adapted this estimation to a metal PHP in a microgravity environment, allowing
a quantitative description of fluid motion even without a direct visualization of the fluid.
Following the procedure suggested by Perna et al. [28], the oscillations of the working
fluid were further described in terms of dominant frequency. However, few studies have
provided data regarding the motion of fluid menisci along space without direct fluid visu-
alizations through transparent inserts [29] or neutron radiography [30], though providing
Energies 2022, 15, 8664 3 of 15

either incomplete pieces of data or adopting hardly repeatable techniques. However, there
are little studies investigating the interaction or similarity of the local heat fluxes.
The purpose of this work is to newly propose investigating the time–space oscillatory
behavior of PHPs through a cross-correlation analysis of the local heat fluxes. Since the
operation of PHP is governed by the fluid oscillation in every tube or channel and the
interactions between them, investigating the cross-correlation of the time-series heat fluxes
at different positions will deepen the understanding on the flow characteristics in PHPs.
In this study, the temperature distribution in the condenser of a seven-turn PHP was first
measured by an Infrared camera. Then, the local heat flux distributions were estimated
by the method in the above literatures, and finally, the cross-correlation of the heat fluxes
at different positions was evaluated. The experimental investigation is described in each
section as follows: the experimental setup including the details of PHP and the procedures
of IHCP and cross-correlation are explained in Section 2, Materials and Methods. In
Section 3, Results and Discussion, the results of cross-correlation analysis are shown and
their interpretations are discussed. The conclusion is stated in Section 4.

2. Materials and Methods

2.1. Experimental Setup
The PHP in this study was fabricated by bending a stainless-steel tube characterized
by an internal diameter of 0.32 mm and a wall thickness of 0.1 mm, 13 times. In the
temperature interval 280–350 K, the internal diameter is lower than the critical value Dcrit
under the gravitational environment specified as [31]:

σ
r
Dcrit = 2 (1)
g(ρl − ρv )

where σ, g, ρl , and ρv are the surface tension, gravitational acceleration, liquid and vapor
densities, respectively. Dcrit values for HFC-134a in the range 280 K–350 K [32] are between
0.99 mm and 1.8 mm.
Both ends of the tubes were interconnected and joined in a T-junction with a tube
leading to a charging port, as shown in Figure 1. The distance between turns at both ends
were 150 mm, divided into an evaporator, an adiabatic section, and a condenser, each with
a length of 50 mm. At the evaporator, the tubes were fixed to a spreader with a polyimide
sheet heater attached on the other side that provided the heat power. The condenser
tubes were covered by a thin layer of highly emitting paint. The cooling at the condenser
was provided by natural convection while heat losses were limited at the evaporator and
adiabatic section through an insulating layer. The PHP was partially filled (filling ratio of
46% vol) with HFC-134a. The temperature at the condenser section was acquired thanks to
a thermographic camera (FLIR SC7000, spatial resolution: 640 × 512 pixels, accuracy: ±1 K,
sensitivity ≤ 20 mK). The temperature in the other sections could not be monitored by the
infrared camera due to the presence of the insulating layer. Therefore, type-T thermocouples
were adopted, and their position is shown in Figure 1. One probe was placed on the sheet
heater (TC1), and three were fixed to the heat spreader at the evaporating section (TC2–TC4).
One sensor was positioned also at the condenser to provide a comparison with the infrared
measurements (TC5). The uncertainties of the measured quantities are reported in Table 1.
The heat power was supplied at the evaporator section with a stepwise function
from 0.1 W to 5 W (up to the operational threshold) by a DC power supply (HEWLETT
PACKARD 6631B). Thermocouples signals were acquired by a digital multimeter (AG-
ILENT 34970A) once a pseudo-steady state was reached in the PHP. The IR camera ac-
quired temperature values with a frequency of 18 Hz while thermocouples of 1 Hz. In the
performed measurements, the PHP worked in vertical bottom heat mode, i.e., with the
evaporator at the bottom. In an earlier analysis [33], further information was provided
about the setup and test conditions.
Energies 2022, 15, 8664 4 of 15

Figure 1. Experimental setup sketch.

Table 1. Measurements uncertainties. –

Temperature
– Voltage Current
±0.2 ◦C 0.03% full scale + 2 mV 0.2% full scale + 1 mA

2.2. Post-Processing
Starting from the time–space temperature distribution measured with thermography,
the local heat flux at the inner channel surface was determined by the solution of the
IHCP in the channel wall. Generally, the fluid-to-wall heat flux cannot be calculated unless
both the wall surface and fluid temperatures are measured. The heat flux was estimated
without measuring fluid temperature by solving IHCP, which is widely used to determine
verifieddistribution
(Biot number ≤ are difficult to measure directly [34]. Every
a heat flux or a temperature verified (Biot
which number ≤
straight portion of the tubes in the condenser section was studied as a 2D-axisimmetric solid
domain, shown in Figure 2. Thanks to the thin-wall approximation, whose validity was
verified (Biot number ≤ 0.1 for all the tests), the outer channel temperature was assumed
equivalent to the inner one. Moreover, due to experimental examinations, the variation of
the wall temperature over the angular coordinate can be considered negligible.

Figure 2. Energy balance at the infinitesimal wall section.

Considering these two assumptions and referring to the infinitesimal wall portion
highlighted in Figure 2, the energy balance is expressed as:

dU
= Q Z − Qz+∆z + Qrin − Qrout (2)
dt
Energies 2022, 15, 8664 5 of 15

where Q Z and Qz+∆z are the heat conduction components in the axial direction z, while
Qrout and Qrin represent the heat transferred to the ambient by natural convection and the
heat transferred from the fluid to the tube inner wall, respectively, and dU
dt is the variation
with time of the internal energy. The terms of the energy balance can be defined as:

dU ∂T  
= ρw c pw ·π rout 2 − rin 2 ·∆z (3a)
dt ∂t
∂T  
Qz = −k w ·π rout 2 − rin 2 (3b)
∂z
∂T   ∂2 T  
Qz+∆z = −k w ·π rout 2 − rin 2 − k w 2 π rout 2 − rin 2 ·∆z (3c)
∂z ∂z
Qrin = q2πrin ·∆z (3d)
( T − Tenv )
Qrout = 2πrout ·∆z (3e)
henv
where ρw , c pw and k w are the wall density, specific heat, and thermal conductivity, re-
spectively. The external and internal radiuses of the tube are symbolized as rout and rin .
Equation (3a) expresses the time-derivative of internal energy of the infinitesimal tube
wall. Equations (3b) and (3c) were derived by the thermal conduction of the tube wall in
axial direction. Equation (3d) expresses fluid-to-wall heat transfer using the heat flux of
q. In Equation (3e), which expresses the heat transfer from the outer surface of the tube
to the ambient air, T, Tenv , and henv are the fluid temperature, the ambient temperature,
and global heat-transfer coefficient between the channel external surface and the ambient,
respectively. By replacing Equations (3a)–(3e) into Equation (2), the heat flux at the channel
internal surface q is expressed as:

∂T 2 
  (T − T ) 
1 ∂T env
q= (ρw c pw − k w 2 )· rout 2 − rin 2 + ·2rout (4)
2rin ∂t ∂z Genv

Equation (4) was resolved adopting the finite difference approach:

   
1  T(z, t+∆t) − T(z,∆t) T(z+∆z, t) + T(z−∆z,t) − 2T(z,t)   T(z,t) − Tenv 
2 2
q(z, t) = (ρw c pw − kw )· r out − r in + · 2r out (5)
2rin  ∆t (∆z)2 Genv 

By solving Equation (5), with inputting the outer surface temperature measured by
the IR camera and the environment temperature during the experiment, the local heat flux
q can be derived. However, because the raw data of the measured surface temperature are
inevitably noisy and the derivative operators are sensitive to small disturbances in the input
data, Equation (5) is likely to give unstable results. To overcome this, the regularization
method [34] was applied: the heat flux can be obtained by employing the filtered tempera-
ture instead of the measured temperature in Equation (5). The filtering temperature was
derived by iterative calculation: first, the raw data of the temperatures was converted to the
frequency domain. Starting from 2 Hz, the cut-off frequency of the filter was increased until
the difference between the measured and the filtered temperatures were nearly equivalent
to the standard deviation of the raw measurements. The detailed process is reported in the
Authors’ previous work [35].
The above post-processing method was validated by solving a direct problem, i.e.,
deriving the heat flux from two known temperatures. The maximum error between the
heat flux estimated by IHCP and the exact flux, i.e., that derived by solving the direct
problem, was found to be equal to 16.1% of exact flux, which provides a reference to the
accuracy of the proposed method. The details of the validation are also given in [35].
Energies 2022, 15, 8664 6 of 15

𝑅𝑥1 ,𝑥2 (𝜏)

To investigate the flow characteristics in the PHP, the similarity of two heat flux signals,
S
referring to two different axial coordinates z, was1evaluated by classical cross-correlation
𝑅
coefficient. For finite functions x1 and x2x,1the(τ)= ∫ x1 (t)xR2 (t
,x2 cross-correlation -τ)dt
x1 ,x2 ( τ ) is estimated by [36]:
S-τ τ
Z S
𝑆 𝜏 1
R x1 ,x2 (τ ) = x1 (t) x2 (t − τ )dt (6)
S−τ τ
t1
where S and τ denote the observation interval and the time delay, respectively.
In order to compare the two heat flux signals at two different time values t1 and t2 ,
it is convenient to choose a M suitable time window and compute the following function
M
based on the cross-correlation between the two shifted signals:
G𝑞1,𝑞2 (t1 ,t2 )= ∫ 𝑞1 (t1 +t)∙𝑞2 (t2 +t)dt
Z M 0
Gq1 ,q2 (t1 , t2 ) = q1 (t1 +t)·q2 (t2 +t)dt (7)
0

Gxq ,xq (t1at,t2zero

The cross-correlation was normalized so that the autocorrelation ) lag is 1:
1 2
Gq ,q ,𝑛𝑜𝑟𝑚𝑎𝑙𝑖𝑧𝑒𝑑 (t1 ,t2 ) =
1 2 Gxq√1G ,xq𝑞21(,𝑞 t2 ),t )√G𝑞1 ,𝑞2 (t2 ,t2 )
t1 ,(t
Gq1 ,q2 ,normalized (t1 , t2 ) = q q2 1 1 (8)
Gq1 ,q2 (t1 , t1 ) Gq1 ,q2 (t2 , t2 )

In this way, the flow structures at the two positions were compared for each window
from the beginning to the end of the temperature measurement by IR camera to find simi-
larities and differences. As shown in Figure 3, the analyzed target was the condenser that
was composed by a section of every straight channel included between 12 mm and 45 mm
from the U-shaped apex. Every channel straight portion was constituted by 214 pixels in
the axial direction. Each pipe was named from Ch 1 to Ch 14 as shown in the left image of
Figure 3. Eight points were selected for the cross-correlation analysis: 1a~1d in Ch1 tube
and 7a~7d in Ch7 as shown in the right image of Figure 3. The distance from the apex of
the U-shape in the condenser was 13 mm for 1a and 7a, 29 mm for 1b and 7b, 38 mm for 1c
and 7c, 44 mm for 1d and 7d. The cross-correlation of the local fluid-to-wall heat flux at
these points were evaluated.

Figure 3. Channel numeration.

3. Results and Discussion

The measurement results for the IR camera suggested that the ascending fluid from
the evaporation section to the condensation section started intermittently at Qele = 0.1 W,
while it stopped in the middle of the condenser. Then, at Qele = 0.5 W, the fluid oscillated
more actively and ascending fluid returned to the evaporator. Figure 4 shows the estimated
heat fluxes at three different positions in the central tube (7a, 7c, and 7d) of the condenser
at Qele = 0.5 W, 2 W, and 3.5 W.
Energies 2022, 15, 8664 7 of 15

(a)

(b)

(c)
Figure 4. Heat fluxes at 7a, 7c, and 7d: (a) Qele = 0.5 W, (b) Qele = 2 W, (c) Qele = 3.5 W.

The heat fluxes clearly showed the transience of the flow regimes: at low power
load of 0.5 W, the fluid oscillation was still intermittent and occurred randomly, while it
– –
transitioned to more periodic and active oscillation with the increase of the power input, as
could be noticed from the increasing frequency and amplitude of the oscillation shown in
Figure –4b,c. Figure 4 presents that the waveforms are consistent when the distance between
two positions is as small as 6 mm (7c and 7d), but they shift when the distance is 31 mm (7a
and 7d). This trend is most pronounced for the heat fluxes at Qel = 0.5 W.
Cross-correlation was applied to the one-minute time-series heat fluxes of two different
combinations of positions on Ch7, namely 7a–7d and 7c–7d. In particular, the cross-
correlation was computed by considering 15-s time windows. The results are shown in
Figures 5–7 for Qele = 0.5 W, 2 W, and 3.5 W, respectively, as the normalized maximum
cross-correlations.
Energies 2022, 15, 8664 8 of 15

(a) (b)
Figure 5. Cross-correlations of heat fluxes at two positions of Ch7 at Qele = 0.5 W, (a) 7a and 7d, (b) 7c
and 7d.

(a) (b)
Figure 6. Cross-correlations of heat fluxes at two positions of Ch7 at Qele = 2 W, (a) 7a and 7d, (b) 7c
and 7d.

(a) (b)
Figure 7. Cross-correlations of heat fluxes at two positions of Ch7 at Qele = 3.5 W, (a) 7a and 7d, (b) 7c
and 7d.

– –

–
Energies 2022, 15, 8664 9 of 15

The three figures revealed the different trends in the cross-correlation depending on
the power input. At 0.5 W, there were no clear cross-correlations between two positions at a
longer distance of 31 mm, as Figure 5a shows, though it could be found from the diagonal
line in two positions at distance of 6 mm as shown in Figure 5b. On the other hand, in
cases of larger heat input of 2 W and 3.5 W, the cross-correlation between two positions
appeared more clearly even in the two positions with the distance of 31 mm. At 3.5 W, the
cross-correlation could be confirmed in both Figure 7a,b so clearly that the difference due to
the distance between two positions was indistinguishable. It suggested that the flow in the
condenser changed with the distance from the evaporator in the low power input, possibly
due to the intermittent and random oscillations. In other words, the fluid heated in the
evaporator did not pass throughout the condenser and stopped in the middle of the tube
due to the low driving force (low saturation pressure difference between the evaporator
and the condenser). On the other hand, in the high-power input, the fluid was presumed
to flow continuously inside the analyzed channel. This is because the higher evaporator
temperature provided sufficient driving force for the working fluid to flow through the
tube, overcoming gravity and shear force mainly between the liquid slug – and the–inner
tube wall.
The cross-correlation method was applied to the heat fluxes at 1a–1d and 1c–1d (i.e.,
the three points in the edge tube Ch1) for Qele = 2 W and 3.5 W, which are shown in
–
Figures 8 and 9, respectively. The target time period and time windows were equal to those
applied for Figures 5–7. Comparison with Figure 6 shows that at 2 W the cross-correlation
between the two positions is ambiguous in Ch1, even at a small distance of 6 mm. The
Figure 9 also shows the same trend, while the diagonal line is shown more clearly than
that of 2 W, in particular in the case of smaller distance (i.e., 6 mm). This suggested two
behaviors of the flow: one was that the fluid oscillated more regularly in the central tubes
than in the edge tubes. The two edge tubes, Ch1 and Ch14, were interconnected at T-
junction which was connected to the manual valve.third oftotal
The the inner
PHP’s whole
volume volume
of the as the
T-junction
and the valve were almost equivalent to one-third of the PHP’s whole volume as the PHP’s
PHP’s inner tube diameter was as small as 0.32 mm. Therefore, p
inner tube diameter was as small as 0.32 mm. Therefore, presumably the junction and the
valve acted as a damper to absorb the fluid oscillation, which caused less active and less
regular oscillation in the edge tubes than that of the central tubes. The other fluid behavior
interpreted by the results of cross-correlation is that the oscillation became uniform in
all the tubes with increase of the heat input. This was presumably because more active
oscillation at higher power input caused by the higher driving force overcame the damper
effect of the edge tubes described above.

(a) (b)
Figure 8. Cross-correlations of heat fluxes at two positions of Ch1 at Qele = 2 W, (a) 1a and 1d, (b) 1c
and 1d.
Energies 2022, 15, 8664 10 of 15

(a) (b)
Figure 9. Cross-correlations of heat fluxes at two positions of Ch1 at Qele = 3.5 W, (a) 1a and 1d, (b) 1c
and 1d.

Figure 10 shows the estimated heat fluxes at 1b and 7b at Qele = 0.5 W, 2 W, and
3.5 W. At 0.5 W, the heat flux remained at zero between the peaks shown every 3~6 s in
each channel as seen in Figure 4a. However, the peaks in each channel appeared to occur
randomly with respect to each other. It is presumed that the fluid oscillation occurred in
each tube randomly but the oscillation does not propagate throughout the PHP. In general,
the propagation of the pressure oscillation between the tubes can be the driving force of
the PHP [37]. This results in better heat transfer performance in a PHP with larger number
of turns than a PHP with smaller number of turns including a single-loop PHP [38]. In
the case of low power input of 0.5 W, there was little interaction of the fluid oscillations
between the tubes, resulted in an intermittent flow with a stop-over period in between.
At high heat input, the heat fluxes showed more regular pulsations. At 2 W, however,
the waveforms of Ch1 and Ch7 still appeared to be unrelated each other, though their dom-
inant frequency were similar in Figure 10b. In addition, the edge tube showed a waveform
with periodic sharp peaks at large amplitudes of up to 4000 W/m2 , whereas that of the
central tube was a more stable oscillation with a maximum heat flux of 400~500 W/m2 .
This suggests the existence of the two different types of flow regimes in the PHP; stable
and continuous oscillation in the central tube and intermittent and rapid flow of the heated
fluid from the evaporator to the condenser in the edge pipe.
Compared with the results of 0.5 W and 2 W, the difference in the waveforms of Ch1
and Ch7 was mitigated at 3.5 W, as shown in Figure 10c. The heat fluxes show the regular
and stable oscillations regardless the tube location, unlike with the result of 2 W. The above
interpretations are consistent with that for Figure 9. In other words, the fluid oscillations
at high power input became more active throughout the PHP due to the high driving
force, and the intermittent oscillations in the edge tubes observed at low inputs were no
longer present.
To investigate the correlations between the edge and central tubes, the cross-correlation
method was applied to the one-minute time-series heat fluxes at 1b and 7b, for Qele = 0.5 W,
2 W, and 3.5 W. The results are displayed in Figure 11. As predicted from Figure 10a, at
0.5 W, there was little cross-correlation between the two tubes. Furthermore, the cross-
correlation appeared clearer than that of 0.5 W with the increase of the heat input, also as
predicted in Figure 10. At 3.5 W, the diagonal line is clearly shown in Figure 11c, though
not as pronounced as in Figures 7 and 9b. This indicated that the flows in the middle and
edge tubes were synchronized. One of the reasonable interpretations for this is that the
PHP was dominated by a unidirectional flow at the high-power input, as the previous
Energies 2022, 15, 8664 11 of 15

studies reported [39,40]. This interpretation is also consistent with the authors′ previous
study [35].

(a)

(b)

(c)
Figure 10. Heat fluxes at 1b and 7b: (a) Qele = 0.5 W, (b) Qele = 2 W, (c) Qele = 3.5 W.
Energies 2022, 15, 8664 12 of 15

(a)

(b) (c)
Figure 11. Cross-correlations of heat fluxes at 1b and 7b (a) Qele = 0.5 W, (b) Qele = 2 W, (c) Qele = 3.5 W.

4. Conclusions
Despite the advantages and several potential applications, PHP has not yet been fully
put into practical use due to the insufficient knowledge of thermo-fluid dynamics principles.
A new approach of applying cross-correlation analysis to local heat fluxes was proposed to
deepen the understanding of the flow characteristics in PHPs. The temperature distribution
in the condenser of a seven-turn PHP was measured with an IR camera, changing the
power input. The local heat flux distributions were assessed by solving the IHCP. The
cross-correlation of the heat fluxes at two different positions in the same tube or different
two tubes in the condenser was analyzed. The main outcomes are as follows:
• No clear cross-correlations were found at low power input of 0.5 W except for the two
points with 6 mm distance in the central tube as the fluid heated in the evaporator did
• not pass throughout the condenser and stopped in the middle of the tube due to the
low driving force.
• At higher inputs of 2 W and 3 W, the fluid oscillated more actively, and the flow became
continuous across the entire tube of the condenser, showing a clear cross-correlation
• with the diagonal.
• At 2 W, there was little cross-correlation between the central and edge tubes, which
suggests the existence of two different flow regimes caused by the damper effect of
the T-junction and the valve.
•• The results for 3.5 W showed clear cross-correlation between the edge and central
tubes, indicating that they were synchronized and suggesting the PHP was dominated
by a unidirectional flow.
•
Energies 2022, 15, 8664 13 of 15

In summary, it is suggested that the original approach presented in this study can lead
to a better understanding of the chaotic fluid oscillations in PHP.

Author Contributions: Conceptualization, F.B. and N.I.; methodology, F.B. and N.I.; software, L.C.,
L.P. and N.I.; validation, L.P., L.C. and F.B.; formal analysis, N.I. and L.P.; investigation, N.I., L.C.,
L.P. and M.M.; resources, F.B.; data curation, N.I. and F.B.; writing—original draft preparation, N.I.;
writing—review and editing, L.C., L.P. and M.M.; visualization, L.C.; supervision, F.B. and S.R.;
project administration, N.I. and F.B.; funding acquisition, N.I. and F.B. All authors have read and
agreed to the published version of the manuscript.
Funding: This work was funded by the European Union′ s Horizon 2020 research and innovation
program under the Marie Skłodowska-Curie grant agreement No 894750.
Data Availability Statement: Not applicable.
Conflicts of Interest: The authors declare no conflict of interest.

Nomenclature

Cp [J/kgK] Specific heat at constant pressure

D [m] Diameter
G [-] Cross-correlation of heat fluxes
g [m/s2 ] Gravity acceleration
h [W/m2 K] Heat transfer coefficient
k [W/mK] Thermal conductivity
M [-] Number of time windows
Q [W] Heat load
q [W/m2 ] Heat flux
R [-] Cross-correlation (General definition)
r [m] Radius
S [-] Observation time interval
T [K] Temperature
t [s] Time
U [J] Internal energy
z [-] Axial coordinate
Special characters
ρ [kg/m3 ] Density
б [N/m] Surface tension
τ [s] Estimate of time delay
Subscripts
crit Critical
ele Electrical
env Environment
in Inner
l Liquid
out Outer
v Vapor
w Wall

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