半导体制冷服设计方法研究进展

Significance Thermal damage and workplace accidents caused by working under high temperatures occur frequently. With advantages of portability, controllability,and environmental protection, semiconductor refrigeration garments are more suitable for use in the working scene. The semiconductor cooling garments can regulate the temperature and humidity of the human micro-environment and reduce the thermal discomfort of workers working in hot environments. This paper summarizes the methods to improve the efficiency and thermal comfort of semiconductor cooling garments which can help save energy and improve the wearing experience. The methods can be used as the basis for further experiments and design. Progress The semiconductor cooling garment can be divided into a cold source module (including the refrigeration part and the heat dissipation part of the hot end) and a heat transfer module of the cold end. For the cold source module, ways to enhance the cooling efficiency involve altering the input and improving heat dissipation at the hot end. The heat dissipation methods of the hot end include forced air cooling, liquid cooling, and heat pipe cooling, different heat dissipation methods have their ways to improve the heat dissipation performance of the hot end, such as changing fan voltage, changing liquid and phase change medium. For the heat transfer module of the cold end, the heat transfer modes include liquid heat transfer, air heat transfer, and contact heat transfer. The appropriate heat transfer mode can be selected according to the working conditions and characteristics of different heat transfer modes. The parameters related to the structure and medium of the heat transfer part are the important factors affecting the heat transfer efficiency and thermal comfort. Thermal comfort experiment is an important way to evaluate and optimize cooling garments. In addition to the results obtained from the human clothing experiment, establishing the thermal comfort model of the human body-cooling garment-environment is an efficient analysis and processing method. Conclusion and Prospect The factors influencing the cooling efficiency and thermal comfort of the semiconductor cooling garments were summarized from various aspects, which provided ideas for the design, optimization, and component selection of semiconductor cooling garments. For the cold source module, to improve the refrigeration efficiency, it is necessary to find the best input voltage and current of different types of cold sources, and conduct voltage input in a controllable and intelligent way. The heat dissipation mode shall be selected based on the weight, volume, and heat dissipation requirements. For the heat transfer part, the weight, efficiency, and thermal comfort of different heat transfer modes need to be considered. For air heat transfer, the heat loss can be reduced and the heat transfer performance can be improved by optimizing the air duct structure, changing the air temperature, wind speed, and air volume and reasonably designing the circulation space. For liquid heat transfer, it is necessary to select an appropriate liquid flow medium, optimize the structure of the liquid cooling pipeline, change the liquid flow rate, inlet temperature, and other parameters, and reduce the weight and volume as much as possible. For contact heat transfer, a comfortable and soft tactile experience is essential, and local supercooling needs to be prevented. The variables of the comfort experiment can not only change the parameters of the device, but also change the experimental environment and explore the human differences to ensure that the cooling clothing can adapt to the thermal comfort requirements under different working conditions. The human experiments and comfort models are both methods to solve the influence of variables. The comfort model can also be used for cold source optimization and comfort prediction. Lightweight, intelligent and comfortable semiconductor cooling garments that are suitable for multiple scenes will become the future research direction.