Phase Change Slurries for Cooling and Storage: An Overview of Research Trends and Gaps

Phase change slurries (PCSs) have great potential as both a heat transfer fluid and anenergy storage medium for cooling processes, cold energy storage, and cold energy transportationdue to desirable thermophysical properties. One of the major benefits of PCSs compared to purephase change materials is their fluidity, thus making them cooled or heated by a heat exchanger,pumped through pipes, discharged, and stored directly in a thermal energy storage tank. The use ofencapsulated phase change slurries and gas hydrate slurry has thus attracted considerable interest asreflected in the literature with a rising number of publications and institutions involved in the area.The use of bibliometric techniques has found a recent interest in the literature to define the progressof different scientific topics and inspire researchers to identify novelties. In this paper, bibliometricanalysis and a detailed systematic review are carried out to show the state-of-the-art developmentof PCSs for cooling applications. Research gaps and hotspots are identified to help define futureperspectives on this topic.