Propagation of a heat pulse in a bounded conducting medium: Thermoelectric detection

Abstract

The one-dimensional, non-steady thermal field on the surface of a bounded conducting sample arising from the absorption of a square heat pulse of arbitrary duration is calculated. It is shown that the spatial temperature distributions for long and short pulses are fundamentally different: After a short heat pulse is “switched off” regions of local heating arise; such regions do not occur in the case of a long pulse. The thermoelectric response is calculated and it is shown that data on the thermal conductivity and thermal diffusivity can be obtained in a single experiment.