Published online by Cambridge University Press: 13 March 2009
The effect of rarefaction, optical depth and ratio of conduction to radiation on the heat transfer through stagnant diatomic gas between parallel plates is investigated. A three-fluid formulation (translator–rotator–photon) at low temperature and [translator–(rotator and vibrator)–photon] at high temperature, based on continuous distribution functions, molecule–molecule elastic collisions, molecule–photon inelastic collisions, grey gas, and local equilibrium is solved by the linearized moment procedure for fully accommodating surfaces. Results include the error involved in decoupled total heat flux.