I. Pop - Böcker

Research into thermal convection in porous media has substantially increased during recent years due to its numerous practical applications. These problems have attracted the attention of industrialists, engineers and scientists from many very diversified disciplines, such as applied mathematics, chemical, civil, environmental, mechanical and nuclear engineering, geothermal physics and food science. Thus, there is a wealth of information now available on convective processes in porous media and it is therefore appropriate and timely to undertake a new critical evaluation of this contemporary information.

Transport Phenomena in Porous Media contains 17 chapters and represents the collective work of 27 of the world's leading experts, from 12 countries, in heat transfer in porous media. The recent intensive research in this area has substantially raised the expectations for numerous new practical applications and this makes the book a most timely addition to the existing literature. It includes recent major developments in both the fundamentals and applications, and provides valuable information to researchers dealing with practical problems in thermal convection in porous media. Each chapter of the book describes recent developments in the highly advanced analytical, numerical and experimental techniques which are currently being employed and discussions of possible future developments are provided. Such reviews not only result in the consolidation of the currently available information, but also facilitate the identification of new industrial applications and research topics which merit further work.

Interest in studying the phenomena of convective heat and mass transfer between an ambient fluid and a body which is immersed in it stems both from fundamental considerations, such as the development of better insights into the nature of the underlying physical processes which take place, and from practical considerations, such as the fact that these idealised configurations serve as a launching pad formodelling the analogous transfer processes in more realistic physical systems. Such idealised geometries also provide a test ground for checking the validity of theoreticalanalyses. Consequently, an immense research effort has been expended in exploring and understanding the convective heat and mass transfer processes between a fluid and submerged objects of various shapes. Among several geometries which have received considerable attention are plates, circular and elliptical cylinders, and spheres, although much information is also available for some other bodies, such ascorrugated surfaces or bodies of relatively complicated shapes.The book is a unified progress report which captures the spirit of the work in progress in boundary-layer heat transfer research and also identifies potential difficulties and areas for further study. In addition, this work provides new material on convective heat and mass transfer, as well as a fresh look at basic methods in heat transfer. Extensive references are included in order to stimulate further studies of the problems considered. A state-of-the-art picture of boundary-layer heat transfer today is presented by listing and commenting also upon the most recent successful efforts and identifying the needs for further research.