This book leads the reader from the well-established wave description of polaritons to their particle description to quantify the polariton contribution to the heat transport along polar and metallic nanofilms, nanowires, and cavities. Over the last few decades, the surface electromagnetic waves propagating along the interface of metals (plasmon polaritons) and polar dielectrics (phonon polaritons) have been widely studied to generate and guide energy currents. And while the optical generation of these polaritons at a given frequency is well known and exploited nowadays, their thermal excitation and propagation in a broad frequency spectrum, explored in detail in this volume, have only more recently been emerging as an effective way to enhance conductive and radiative heat currents. Written by the foremost experts and researchers in nanoscale heat transport, this book consolidates in a single comprehensive view, the findings on surface electromagnetic waves as the 4th heat carriers, besides phonons, photons, and electrons.

This book:

• Imparts knowledge on polaritons as the 4th heat carriers, besides phonons, electrons, and photons.
• Presents basic insights into thermal radiation and surface electromagnetic waves.

• Explains the quantification of the polariton heat transport using the Boltzmann transport equation and Maxwell's equations.

  Autorentext

  Sebastian Volz has been developing direct simulations and characterizations to understand the role of phonons, electrons, and photons in the thermal behaviour of micro and nano-structures. His group was involved in large European projects on thermoelectricity and thermal interface materials. Sebastian Volz has led the European Thermal NanoSciences and NanoEngineering network of the CNRS for 17 years and is now the director of the Laboratory for Integrated Micro-Mechatronic Systems (LIMMS), joint between CNRS and The University of Tokyo.

  Dr. Jose Ordonez-Miranda is a CNRS researcher working at the laboratory LIMMS located at the University of Tokyo, Japan. His research area is the heat transport driven by phonons, photons, and polaritons propagating in nano, micro- and macro-materials with applications in thermal computing (thermotronics), electronics, photonics, and thermoelectricity. The Boltzmann transport equation, Fourier's law, Stefan-Boltzmann's formula, Maxwell's equations of electromagnetism, and fluctuational electrodynamics are his main tools for theoretically and experimentally studying the heat transport in linear and non-linear materials subjected to steady-state and dynamical conditions.