findThermalProperties

(To be removed) Find thermal material properties assigned to a geometric region

findThermalProperties will be removed. Use the MaterialProperties property of femodel instead. (since R2023a) For more information on updating your code, see Version History.

Syntax

tmpa = findThermalProperties(materialProperties,RegionType,RegionID)

Description

tmpa = findThermalProperties(materialProperties,RegionType,RegionID) returns thermal material properties tmpa assigned to the specified region.

Examples

Find Thermal Conductivity, Mass Density, and Specific Heat for Faces of 2-D Geometry

Create a transient thermal model that has three faces.

thermalmodel = createpde("thermal","transient");
geometryFromEdges(thermalmodel,@lshapeg);
pdegplot(thermalmodel,"FaceLabels","on")
ylim([-1.1,1.1])
axis equal

For face 1, specify the following thermal properties:

• Thermal conductivity is $10\mathrm{W}/\left(\mathrm{m}{\cdot }^{\circ }\mathit{C}\right)$

• Mass density is $1\mathrm{kg}/{\mathrm{m}}^3$

• Specific heat is $0.1\mathrm{J}/\left(\mathrm{kg}{\cdot }^{\circ }\mathrm{C}\right)$

thermalProperties(thermalmodel,"ThermalConductivity",10,...
                               "MassDensity",1,...
                               "SpecificHeat",0.1,...
                               "Face",1);

For face 2, specify the following thermal properties:

• Thermal conductivity is $20\mathrm{W}/\left(\mathrm{m}{\cdot }^{\circ }\mathit{C}\right)$

• Mass density is $2\mathrm{kg}/{\mathrm{m}}^3$

• Specific heat is $0.2\mathrm{J}/\left(\mathrm{kg}{\cdot }^{\circ }\mathrm{C}\right)$

thermalProperties(thermalmodel,"ThermalConductivity",20,...
                               "MassDensity",2,...
                               "SpecificHeat",0.2,...
                               "Face",2);

For face 3, specify the following thermal properties:

• Thermal conductivity is $30\mathrm{W}/\left(\mathrm{m}{\cdot }^{\circ }\mathit{C}\right)$)

• Mass density is $3\mathrm{kg}/{\mathrm{m}}^3$

• Specific heat is $0.3\mathrm{J}/\left(\mathrm{kg}{\cdot }^{\circ }\mathrm{C}\right)$

thermalProperties(thermalmodel,"ThermalConductivity",30,...
                               "MassDensity",3,...
                               "SpecificHeat",0.3,...
                               "Face",3);

Check the material properties specification for face 1.

mpaFace1 = findThermalProperties(thermalmodel.MaterialProperties, ...
                                                        "Face",1)

mpaFace1 = 
  ThermalMaterialAssignment with properties:

             RegionType: 'face'
               RegionID: 1
    ThermalConductivity: 10
            MassDensity: 1
           SpecificHeat: 0.1000

Check the heat source specification for faces 2 and 3.

mpa = findThermalProperties(thermalmodel.MaterialProperties, ...
                                              "Face",[2,3]);
mpaFace2 = mpa(1)

mpaFace2 = 
  ThermalMaterialAssignment with properties:

             RegionType: 'face'
               RegionID: 2
    ThermalConductivity: 20
            MassDensity: 2
           SpecificHeat: 0.2000

mpaFace3 = mpa(2)

mpaFace3 = 
  ThermalMaterialAssignment with properties:

             RegionType: 'face'
               RegionID: 3
    ThermalConductivity: 30
            MassDensity: 3
           SpecificHeat: 0.3000

Input Arguments

materialProperties — Material properties of the model

MaterialProperties property of a thermal model

Material properties of the model, specified as the MaterialProperties property of a thermal model.

Example: thermalmodel.MaterialProperties

RegionType — Geometric region type

"Face" for a 2-D model | "Cell" for a 3-D model

Geometric region type, specified as "Face" or "Cell".

Example: findThermalProperties(thermalmodel.MaterialProperties,"Cell",1)

Data Types: char | string

RegionID — Geometric region ID

vector of positive integers

Geometric region ID, specified as a vector of positive integers. Find the region IDs by using pdegplot.

Example: findThermalProperties(thermalmodel.MaterialProperties,"Face",1:3)

Data Types: double

Output Arguments

tmpa — Material properties assignment

ThermalMaterialAssignment object

Material properties assignment, returned as a ThermalMaterialAssignment object. See ThermalMaterialAssignment Properties.

Version History

Introduced in R2017a

R2025a: To be removed

findThermalProperties will be removed. Use the MaterialProperties property of femodel instead.

For example, you can check the material properties specification for the three faces of the 2-D geometry as follows.

model = femodel(AnalysisType="thermalTransient", ...
                Geometry=@lshapeg);
model.MaterialProperties(1) = ...
        materialProperties(ThermalConductivity=10, ...
                           MassDensity=1, ...
                           SpecificHeat=0.1);
model.MaterialProperties(2) = ...
        materialProperties(ThermalConductivity=20, ...
                           MassDensity=2, ...
                           SpecificHeat=0.2);
model.MaterialProperties(3) = ...
        materialProperties(ThermalConductivity=30, ...
                           MassDensity=3, ...
                           SpecificHeat=0.3);
model.MaterialProperties

The unified finite element model workflow defines the type of a problem and all of its parameters as the properties of an femodel object. This object enables you to specify physical parameters for structural, thermal, and electromagnetic types of analyses. The solver in the unified workflow uses only the parameters (properties) appropriate for the current analysis type while ignoring all other properties. If you switch the analysis type by setting the AnalysisType property of the model, the solver uses the appropriate set of properties corresponding to the new analysis type.

For more help migrating your existing code that uses ThermalModel to the unified finite element workflow, see Migration from Domain-Specific to Unified Workflow.