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BE 103B
Spring, 2001


Sample Questions from Previous Finals

1. Skin temperature is normally 33 C

, but skin becomes irreversibly

damaged when it reaches 62 C

. How deep is the layer of damaged skin after

accidentally stepping in a barbeque pit at the beach? The temperature of the
barbeque is 200 C

and contact lasts 1 second. The thermal diffusivity of skin is

7 2
1.0 10 m s

.

2. A typical lab furnace has a 0.106-m inner layer of fireclay brick and a
0.635-cm outer layer of steel. The heat transfer coefficients at the inside and
outside wall surfaces are
2
5110W m K and
2
45W m K , and the inside and
outside air temperatures during operation are 1340 K and 295 K, respectively.
,373
1.13
fcbrick K
k W m K = and
,373
42.9
steel K
k W m K = .
a) Determine the overall heat transfer rate per square meter of wall area
under these conditions.
b) What are the temperatures at each surface and at the brick-steel
interface?

3. At rest, the human body produces heat at a constant rate as a byproduct
of basal metabolism. This heat is dissipated to the surroundings and a steady-
state temperature profile is reached in the body. Approximate the body as a slab
with uniform heat generation throughout. Assume that the body is symmetrical
about its vertical-frontal plane and that heat is transferred from the centerline to
the surface primarily by conduction. Assume that the rate of metabolic heat
generation is
3
1.4kW m , the average half thickness of the body is 7.5 cm, the
body surface temperature is 33 C

, and 1.05
tissue
k W m K = .
a) Write down the conservation equation and boundary conditions.
b) Solve for the temperature distribution in the body.
c) Make a plot of the temperature distribution.

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4. Calculate the heat flux through an airplane window when flying at 500
miles/hour and 35,000 ft, where the outside atmospheric temperature is 68
Fahrenheit. The window is 1 ft
2
and made of double-pane glass, with gas
trapped between the panes. Each pane is inch thick and the two panes are
separated by a inch-thick stagnant gas layer. The thermal conductivity of the
window glass is 0.85W m K and that of the gas layer between panes is
0.025W m K over the temperature range of interest. The heat transfer
coefficient corresponding to the air inside the cabin is
2
20W m K . You can
assume the boundary layer starts at the leading edge of the window and the
thermal properties are independent of atmospheric pressure.

5. Sterilization of a solution is often done by bubbling chlorine gas through
the solution. Consider a single bubble of pure chlorine gas at 1.0 atm with
diameter
*
0.5 D = cm rising at a velocity of 20 cm/s in water at 16 C

. Chlorine
from the bubble dissolves in the water and diffuses away. At this temperature,
2
9 2
,
1.26 10
chlorine H O
D m s

= and the maximum amount of chlorine that can

dissolve in water is 0.823 g chlorine per 100 g water. What is the rate (in grams
per second) of absorption from the bubble? (You can ignore the fact that the
bubble diameter becomes smaller as chlorine is lost, and assume that dissolved
chlorine does not change the density of the water.)
2
3
1000
H O
kg m = and
2
3
1.155 10
H O
kg m s

= .

6. List five "big ideas" from this course and describe their significance.

7. For each of the following, give a word definition, explain how it is used,
and give a biological example: Reynolds number; Sherwood number; Schmidt
number; Rayleigh number; Thiele number; Nusselt number; Partition coefficient;
Prandtl number.

8. a. What is the film temperature and why is it needed? b. Values for the
thermal conductivity and thermal diffusivity in blood increase with decreasing
temperature. Why? Values for the molecular diffusivity of oxygen increase with
increasing temperature. Why?

9. Implanted pancreatic islet constructs must derive oxygen, glucose and
nutrients from the tissues in which they are implanted. In the intact pancreas, the
oxygen concentration in the islet is maintained homogeneously at 0.1 mM by
close association with its internal microcirculation. However, when islets are
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prepared for implantation, the internal microcirculation is disrupted and the cells
must rely on diffusion from the surrounding tissue in which they are implanted.
To produce enough insulin for an adult, islets are densely packed into several
porous hollow fiber cylinders, each 0.5 mm in diameter and 2.0 cm in length.
Write down models to describe glucose, oxygen and insulin distributions within a
fiber. You may assume that glucose and oxygen are consumed
stoichiometrically and that insulin synthesis is proportional to the local glucose
concentration.

10. Calculate the energy dissipated at steady state per unit length at the
surface of a working cylindrical muscle 2 cm in diameter. The heat generated in
the muscle is
3
5.8kW m and the thermal conductivity of the muscle is
0.42W m K . What is the maximum temperature rise
( )
max surface
T T in the
muscle?

11. A fermentation broth for expansion of a stem cell culture consists of an
aqueous solution of nutrients and cells. As the cells grow, they cluster into
spherical pellets of radius R(t). On average, the cell density inside a pellet is
0.02mg of cell mass per cubic millimeter of pellet volume. Dissolved oxygen
concentration in the broth is
3
5 g cm . The cells utilize oxygen at a rate of
1.2mmole of oxygen per hour per gram of cell mass, via a zero-order reaction.
Assume that the diffusion coefficient of oxygen within the pellet is
2
5 2
,
1.8 10
O pell
D cm s

= . How large can R become before the oxygen

concentration becomes zero at the center of the pellet? Assume that the broth
external to the pellets is well-mixed.

12. In fabricating rubber tires, the vulcanization or curing process requires that
the tire body, originally at 295K , be heated so that its central layer reaches a
minimum temperature of 410K . This is achieved by exposing both sides to
steam at 435K . Determine the time required after initiating the steam treatment
for a 3-cm thick tire body to reach the required central temperature condition.
Properties of the rubber are the following:
0.151 , k W m K - = 200 ,
p
c J kgm K - =
3
1200 , kg m = and
8 2
6.19 10 . m s o

=

13. 105 years ago, Einstein showed that continuous diffusion is consistent
with a random walk process.
a) Outline the steps he used to show this relationship.
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b) Specifically, how is this relationship useful?

14. Consider a stagnant body of water at 25 C

with a suspended colony of

microorganisms having an effective diameter of 0.1 mm. Oxygen diffuses
through the water to the surface of the microoganisms where it is completely
consumed, maintaining zero concentration at the surface. Oxygen in the bulk
water is in equilibrium with air (21 % oxygen). Henry's constant for oxygen and
water is
4
4.4 10 H atm mole fraction = at 25 C

, the diffusivity is
2 2
9 2
,
3.25 10
O H O
D m s

= and the density is

2
3
1000
H O
kg m = . a) Write the
governing equation for oxygen diffusion in water, considering radial variation
only. b) Write down the boundary conditions needed. c) Obtain the oxygen
concentration profile as a function of radius. d) Calculate the oxygen
concentration in the bulk, assuming equilibrium between air and water. e)
Calculate the rate of oxygen consumption by the microorganism colony in
2
mol m s - .

15.
a) What was Fouriers big idea?
b) What is the difference between apparent kinetics and intrinsic kinetics?
When are each useful? Give an example of each.
c) At what value of x is a semi-infinite body essentially finite? To what
degree of accuracy? J ustify your answer. What is the significance of
this? What assumptions are required?


Some Potentially Useful Equations
"
( )
p
x
p
d c T
dT k dU
q k
dx c dx dx

= = =
( )
p p
T uT T
k c Q c
x x x t

c c c c | |
+ =
|
c c c c
\ .

2 2 2
2 2 2
p p
k T T T Q T
c x y z c t
( c c c c
+ + + =
(
c c c c


1 2
1
1
T T
q
L
k A

=
1
h l
x
h
T T
q
h A

=
2 2
2 2 2
1 1
p p
k T T T Q T
r
c r r r r z c t |
( | | c c c c c | |
+ + + =
( | |
c c c c c
\ .
\ .

4 4
( )
s surr
q A T T c o =
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2
2
2 2 2 2 2
1 1 1
sin
sin sin
p p
k T T T Q T
r
c r r r r r c t
u
u | u u u
( c c c c c c | | | |
+ + + =
| | (
c c c c c c
\ . \ .



2 2 2 2
2
( )
1
2 2
l
Q x L QL x
T T
k k L
| |
= =
|
\ .
( ) q hA T T

=
2
2
0
c
hP
x kA
u
u
c
=
c

fin
no fin c
q
kP
q hA
= ( )
r s surr
q h T T '' =
n n
Nu Sh
Pr Sc
= ( )
p
dT hA
T T
dt mc

=
1 2
2 1
( )
ln( )
T T
q k
r r

'' =
( ) exp exp
i p
T T hA
t Bi Fo
T T mc

-
| |

= =
|
|

\ .

1 2
1 2
4 ( )
(1 ) (1 )
k T T
q
r r
t
=

12 13 5
4 5 13 6
0.664Re Pr Re 2 10
0.058Re Pr Re 3 10
L L L
L L L
Nu for
Nu for
= <
= >
(Re , Pr)
L
L
fluid
h L
f
k
=

12 13
2 0.6Re Pr
D D
Nu = +
6
T
D
r
k
t
=

"
( , ) (
( )
2
s s i
s
i s
T x t T k T T x
erf q t
T T
t t o to
| |
= =
|

\ .

2
1
4sin
exp( )cos( ) where and
2 sin(2 )
n
n n n n
n
n n
C Fo x C

u

- -
=
= =
+

tan
n n
Bi =
2
1 1 1
1
1
exp( ) sin( ) C Fo r
r
u

- -
-
=
2
2 1)
2
0
4( 1) (2 1)
cos
(2 1) 2
n
n
t
L s
n
i s
T T n x
e
T T n L
t
o
t
t
+ | |

|
\ .
=
+
=
+