Measurements of pressure gradient and temperature gradient driven flows in a rectangular channel

The objective of this experimental investigation is to characterize the gas–surface interaction under different flow conditions. Therefore, the mass flow rates driven by a pressure gradient under isothermal conditions and by only a temperature gradient under constant pressure conditions are measured in the same microchannel for five different gases: helium, neon, nitrogen, argon and krypton. The pressure driven experiments are carried out in the hydrodynamic and slip flow regimes, . Using a previously developed methodology, the velocity and thermal slip coefficients are derived from the measured mass flow rates. By adopting the classical Maxwell boundary condition, the accommodation coefficients are found to be very different for both types of flows, with a significantly lower value for polyatomic nitrogen in the case of temperature gradient driven flows. An attempt to calculate the tangential momentum and normal energy accommodation coefficients in the frame of the Cercignani–Lampis model was successful only for the tangential momentum accommodation coefficient, which was found to be very close to that derived with the Maxwell model. However, it was not possible to obtain the values of the normal energy accommodation coefficient due to a lack of numerical results which connect the thermal slip and normal energy accommodation coefficients for very low values of the latter.