Microwave heating of ceramic composites

The microwave heating of a ceramic composite is modelled and analysed. The composite consists of many small ceramic particles embedded in a ceramic cement. The composite is assumed to be well insulated, and each particle is assumed to be in imperfect thermal contact with the surrounding cement. Based on these two assumptions an asymptotic theory exploiting the small Blot number and small non-dimensional contact conductance is developed. Our asymptotic theory yields a set of nonlinear partial differential equations which govern the temperature in the composite. These are reduced to a set of coupled nonlinear ordinary differential equations in which the surface area of each particle enters as a parameter. Recent experiments with such composites have shown that the steady-state temperature of the composite is strongly dependent upon the radii of the embedded particles. Our model captures this effect. In fact, our analysis shows that the assumption of imperfect thermal contact between the particles and the ceramic cement is essential for this trend to be established.