# Passive radiative "thermostat" enabled by phase-change photonic nanostructures

## TL;DR

This paper introduces a passive radiative thermostat using phase-change nanostructures that self-adjust their optical properties to passively regulate temperature by leveraging the sky for heating or cooling, without active control.

## Contribution

It proposes a novel nanophotonic device based on phase-change materials for passive thermal regulation, utilizing radiative heat transfer principles.

## Key findings

- Simulated daytime cooling and heating performance with vanadium dioxide films.
- Device maintains temperature within phase transition region during day and night.
- Potential for thermal management in regions with extreme temperature variations.

## Abstract

A thermostat senses the temperature of a physical system and switches heating or cooling devices on or off, regulating the flow of heat to maintain the system's temperature near a desired setpoint. Taking advantage of recent advances in radiative heat transfer technologies, here we propose a passive radiative "thermostat" based on phase-change photonic nanostructures for thermal regulation at room temperature. By self-adjusting their visible to mid-IR absorptivity and emissivity responses depending on the ambient temperature, the proposed devices use the sky to passively cool or heat during day-time using the phase-change transition temperature as the setpoint, while at night-time temperature is maintained at or below ambient. We simulate the performance of a passive nanophotonic thermostat design based on vanadium dioxide thin films, showing daytime passive cooling (heating) with respect to ambient in hot (cold) days, maintaining an equilibrium temperature approximately locked within the phase transition region. Passive radiative thermostats can potentially enable novel thermal management technologies, e.g. to moderate diurnal temperature in regions with extreme annual thermal swings.