Aims to develop a computational thermal manikin to accurately predict the thermal comfort of a human in a room by computer simulation. The human's thermal sensation directly depends on heat transfer characteristics between the human and the surrounding environment. The thermal environment around a modelled manikin will be examined by numerical simulation of airflow, thermal radiation, heat conduction, moisture transport, solar radiation, and so on in a coupled way. Describes the concept of the computational thermal manikin and its first-stage development. Flow and temperature fields around the human body have been investigated by modelling the thermal manikin with computational fluid dynamics (CFD). The convective heat transfer characteristics of the modelled manikin are predicted for several types of flow field ie., stagnant flow, horizontal uniform flow, downward flow, and upward uniform flow. The CFD simulations are conducted using a low-Reynolds-number epsilon turbulence model. In order to model the complicated shape of the human body, a generalised curvilinear coordinate system (boundary fitted coordinates) is used. The results obtained agree well with previous experimental data.

KEYWORDS: year 1997, Air flow, heat flow, moisture, thermal comfort, human body, manikins, calculating, heat transfer coefficient, temperature