Thesis (S.B.)--Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Dept. of Mechanical Engineering, 2011.Cataloged from PDF version of thesis.Includes bibliographical references (p. 48).The superheat required to initiate nucleate boiling inside porous wicks is not well understood in practice. This thesis reports the design of an experimental setup for investigating the onset of vapor nucleation in sintered porous structures. Pressure sensing was evaluated as an effective means of detecting the onset of nucleation. Thermal studies were conducted with a custom finite difference script in conjunction with finite element analysis. Heat conduction through a three dimensional wick was reduced to one dimensional conduction via symmetry and design constraints. The wick was optimized to achieve a temperature drop of 30 *C at a common heat pipe operating temperature of 70 °C.by Mitchell Joseph Kelley.S.B
