Thermal Radiation Physics and Modeling

In this chapter thermal radiation physics and modeling is reduced to its basics for practical applications. After introducing basic radiometric quantities, the concepts of diffuse and black-body radiators are laid out, and Kirchhoff’s law is studied in these idealized cases. After introducing view factors, radiation exchange is examined exemplified by multi-layer insulation. We apply these results to determine and control the thermal balance of a spacecraft both by α/ε materials and by an extensive and practical introduction to modern thermal modeling techniques provided by the authors P. Hager (ESA thermal engineer) and M. Czupalla (University of Applied Sciences at Aachen).