The conceptions of a new particle curtain heat exchanger and the particle curtain heat exchanger units based air preheater were proposed.Moreover

under the assumption that the solid and gas had reached thermal equilibrium instantaneously

the mathematical model of heat transfer was established.At last

the characteristics of heat transfer between hot particles and cold air flow

and cold particles and hot air flow under different operation conditions were investigated. The results show that

when the particle mass flow is sufficient

the average temperature of the outlet cold fluid can be infinitely close to the initial temperature of the hot fluid

indicating the particle-curtain based unit can achieve absolute heat transfer between the falling particle curtain and the horizontally-flowing gas stream.In conclusion

the gas-solid heat exchanger based on particle curtains shows a great technological advantage in comparison with the traditional shell and tube air preheater

which will provide a new research direction for the present study of air preheaters and the exhaust heat recovery technologies in industry.