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Inorganic salt hydrates are promising phase-change materials (PCMs) for thermal energy storage due to their high latent heat of fusion. However, their practical application is often limited by their unstable form, dehydration, large supercooling, and low thermal conductivity. Porous melamine foam and its carbonized derivatives are potential supporting porous materials to encapsulate inorganic salt hydrate PCMs to address these problems. This work investigates the effect of pyrolysis temperature on the morphology and structure of the carbonized foams and their thermal energy storage performance. Pyrolysis of melamine foam at 700−900 °C leads to the formation of crystalline sodium cyanate and sodium carbonate particles on the foam skeleton surface, which allows the spontaneous impregnation of the carbon foam with molten CaCl2·6H2O.The form-stable foam-CaCl2·6H2O composite effectively suppresses supercooling and dehydration, demonstrating the efficacy of carbon foam as a promising supporting material for inorganic salt hydrate PCMs.
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Causal Structure in Spin Foams
The metric field of general relativity is almost fully determined by its causal structure. Yet, in spin foam models of quantum gravity, the role played by the causal structure is still largely unexplored. The goal of this paper is to clarify how causality is encoded in such models. The quest unveils the physical meaning of the orientation of the two-complex and its role as a dynamical variable. We propose a causal version of the EPRL spin foam model and discuss the role of the causal structure in the reconstruction of a semiclassical space–time geometry.
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- Award ID(s):
- 2207851
- PAR ID:
- 10517097
- Publisher / Repository:
- MDPI
- Date Published:
- Journal Name:
- Universe
- Volume:
- 10
- Issue:
- 4
- ISSN:
- 2218-1997
- Page Range / eLocation ID:
- 181
- Format(s):
- Medium: X
- Sponsoring Org:
- National Science Foundation
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- Free Publicly Accessible Full Text
-
Accepted Manuscript1.0
- Journal Article:
- https://doi.org/10.3390/universe10040181
