EFFECTS OF ELECTRIC AND MAGNETIC FIELDS ON THERMAL INSTABILITY IN NATURAL CONVECTION FLOW OVER A ROTATING BOUNDARY LAYER

In this paper, the boundary-layer natural convection flow on a permeable vertical plate with thermal radiation and mass transfer is studied when the plate moves in its own plane. A uniform temperature with uniform species concentration at the plate is affected and the fluid is considered to be a gray, absorbing–emitting. A viscous flow model is presented using boundary-layer theory comprising the momentum, energy, and concentration equations, which is solved analytically by means of an excellent method called homotopy analysis method (HAM). First, a comparison between HAM results and those obtained by means of a higher-order numerical method, namely differential quadrature method (DQM), is done. Close agreement of two sets of results indicates the accuracy of the HAM. The velocity, temperature, and concentration distributions are displayed graphically, and a parametric study is performed in which the effect of various parameters on the skin friction, the local Nusselt number (Nn), and the local Sherwood number (Mu) are investigated.

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Transient two-dimensional natural convection flow of a nanofluid past an isothermal vertical plate using Buongiorno’s model

International Journal of Numerical Methods for Heat &amp Fluid Flow ◽

10.1108/hff-09-2015-0394 ◽

2017 ◽

Vol 27 (1) ◽

pp. 23-47 ◽

Cited By ~ 9

Author(s):

Marneni Narahari ◽

Suresh Kumar Raju Soorapuraju ◽

Rajashekhar Pendyala ◽

Ioan Pop

Keyword(s):

Boundary Layer ◽

Nusselt Number ◽

Brownian Motion ◽

Natural Convection ◽

Vertical Plate ◽

Volume Fraction ◽

Convection Flow ◽

Nanoparticle Volume Fraction ◽

Natural Convection Flow ◽

Content Type

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to present a numerical investigation of the transient two-dimensional natural convective boundary-layer flow of a nanofluid past an isothermal vertical plate by incorporating the effects of Brownian motion and thermophoresis in the mathematical model. Design/methodology/approach The problem is formulated using the Oberbeck–Boussinesq and the standard boundary-layer approximations. The governing coupled non-linear partial differential equations for conservation of mass, momentum, thermal energy and nanoparticle volume fraction have been solved by using an efficient implicit finite-difference scheme of the Crank–Nicolson type, which is stable and convergent. Numerical computations are performed and the results for velocity, temperature and nanoparticle volume fraction are presented in graphs at different values of system parameters such as Brownian motion parameter, thermophoresis parameter, buoyancy ratio parameter, Prandtl number, Lewis number and dimensionless time. The results for local and average skin-friction and Nusselt number are also presented graphically and discussed thoroughly. Findings It is found that the velocity, temperature and nanoparticle volume fraction profiles enhance with respect to time and attain steady-state values as time progresses. The local Nusselt number is found to decrease with increasing thermophoresis parameter, while it increases slightly with increasing Brownian motion parameter. To validate the present numerical results, the steady-state local Nusselt number results for the limiting case of a regular fluid have been compared with the existing well-known results at different Prandtl numbers, and the results are found to be in an excellent agreement. Research limitations/implications The present analysis is limited to the transient laminar natural convection flow of a nanofluid past an isothermal semi-infinite vertical plate in the absence of viscous dissipation and thermal radiation. The unsteady natural convection flow of a nanofluid will be investigated for various physical conditions in a future work. Practical implications Unsteady flow devices offer potential performance improvements as compared with their steady-state counterparts, and the flow fields in the unsteady flow devices are typically transient in nature. The present study provides very useful information for heat transfer engineers to understand the heat transfer enhancement with the nanofluid flows. The present results have immediate relevance in cooling technologies. Originality/value The present research work is relatively original and illustrates the transient nature of the natural convective nanofluid boundary-layer flow in the presence of Brownian motion and thermophoresis.

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