This study explores the use of Multi-Objective Genetic Algorithm (MOGA) for thermodynamic characteristics of serrated plate-fin heat exchanger (PFHE) under numerical simulation method. Numerical investigations on the important structural parameters of the serrated fin and the j factor and the f factor of PFHE are conducted, and the experimental correlations about the j factor and the f factor are determined by comparing the simulation results with the experimental data. Meanwhile, based on the principle of minimum entropy generation, the thermodynamic analysis of the heat exchanger is investigated, and the optimization calculation is carried out by MOGA. The comparison results between optimized structure and original show that the j factor increases by 3.7%, the f factor decreases by 7.8%, and the entropy generation number decreases by 31%. From the data point of view, the optimized structure has the most obvious effect on the entropy generation number, which shows that the entropy generation number can be more sensitive to the irreversible changes caused by the structural parameters, and at the same time, the j factor is appropriately increased.
Keywords: genetic algorithm; optimization; plate-fin heat exchanger; serrated fin.