Local wall heat flux in confined thermal convection

We report highly resolved measurements of the local wall heat flux in turbulent Rayleigh-Bénard convection using an infrared camera. The measurements have been undertaken in a Rayleigh-Bénard cell with rectangular base of 2.50 m × 0.65 m and a height of 2.5 m which is filled with air. First of all, it could be demonstrated that in a Rayleigh-Bénard cell with rectangular cross-section the time-averaged wall heat flux locally deviates by 30% from its mean. Furthermore, a strong correlation between the global flow structure inside the cell and the distribution of the local wall heat flux could be identified.