Thermal Insulation Design of Portable Radioisotope Electrical Generators
Name
PowerMEMS2019.pdf
Description
Accepted version
Size
377.74 KB
Format
Adobe PDF
Checksum (MD5)
52b86b3299fa3d83caf915f89c79b983
Author(s)
Wang, X.
Chan, Walker R
Fisher, Peter H
Liang, R.
Xu, J.
Date Issued
April 2020
Journal
19th International Conference on Micro and Nanotechnology for Power Generation and Energy Conversion Applications, PowerMEMS 2019
Publisher
Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE)
Citation
Wang, X. et al. "Thermal Insulation Design of Portable Radioisotope Electrical Generators." 19th International Conference on Micro and Nanotechnology for Power Generation and Energy Conversion Applications, December 2019, Krakow, Poland, Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers, April 2020 © 2019 IEEE
Version
Author's final manuscript
Abstract
Radioisotope generators can provide power for several decades without the need of any further energy input, such as solar or chemical energy. A portable radioisotope generator can foresee many applications in future military and civilian uses that require minimum access and maintenance, such as to power sensors in a polar region, on a floating buoy, or undersea. In this work, we report the design, simulation, and measurement results of the thermal insulation of a miniaturized radioisotope system. We tested a prototype powered by an electrical heater with the same size as a plutonium fuel pellet. We tested the material compatibilities and showed the designs suitable for generators using thermoelectric and thermophotovoltaic converters respectively. In addition, we proposed a new insulation that uses a layered dielectric's omni-directional reflectivity as a futuristic insulation mechanism to shield radiation heat for micro to meso-scale thermal systems.
MIT Department
Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Department of Physics
Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Institute for Soldier Nanotechnologies
Terms of Use
Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike
Persistent DSpace Link
DOI of Published Version
https://doi.org/10.1109/powermems49317.2019.61547404455
