Thermal Radiation at the Nanoscale and Applications

Nanostructured materials offer new opportunities for shaping the infrared thermal spectrum and improving the performance of thermal devices. In addition, there has been a paradigm shift from the familiar laws of thermal radiation derived over a century ago, to a general framework known as fluctuational electrodynamics that allows calculations of radiative heat transfer for arbitrary sizes and distances. Near-field radiative heat transfer and thermal emission in systems of sub-wavelength size can exhibit super-Planckian behaviour, i.e. flux rates several orders of magnitude larger than that predicted by the Stefan–Boltzmann (or blackbody) limit. These effects can be combined with novel materials to yield even larger modifications and spectral selectivity.

Guest Editors: Pierre-Olivier Chapuis, Bong Jae Lee, and Alejandro Rodriguez