We study the dependence of the heat transfer between two semi-infinite solids
on the dielectric properties of the bodies. We show that the heat transfer at
short separation between the solids may increase by many order of magnitude
when the surfaces are covered by adsorbates, or can support low-frequency
surface plasmons. In this case the heat transfer is determined by resonant
photon tunneling between adsorbate vibrational modes, or surface plasmon modes.
We study the dependence of the heat flux between two metal surfaces on the
electron concentration using the non-local optic dielectric approach, and co
mpare with the results obtained within local optic approximation.Comment: 5 pages, 3 figure
