ABSTRACT
Although the Green’s function (GF) approach represents a powerful and flexible method for solving heat conduction and diffusion problems, it is necessary to have mathematical expressions for the GFs. Many GFs are known; Appendixes X, R, and RS provide listings of GFs in a systematic form for rectangular, cylindrical, and spherical coordinates, respectively. The purpose of this chapter is to demonstrate several methods of obtaining exact expressions for the GFs. Galerkin-based GFs for composite bodies and other difficult cases are discussed in Chapters 10 and 11. Once the GF is known for a given problem, the general solution of the problem can be written down immediately using the GF solution equations given in Chapter 3; integrations may still be needed, but the integrations can be performed numerically, if not analytically.
