thermalcontrol
Thermal control is the engineering discipline focused on maintaining the temperature of components, systems, or structures within specified limits by managing heat generation and removal. It seeks to balance heat production with heat dissipation to ensure performance, reliability, and safety. Key concepts include heat transfer mechanisms—conduction, convection, and radiation—and the use of thermal resistance and conductance to quantify how easily heat moves between surfaces.
Approaches are broadly categorized as passive or active. Passive methods rely on natural heat flow and materials
In space systems, thermal control must operate in vacuum and wide temperature ranges. Radiative heat exchange
Thermal analysis uses models and testing to predict temperatures under operating conditions; metrics include thermal resistance,