JMP20110200003 12117895 PDF
JMP20110200003 12117895 PDF
JMP20110200003 12117895 PDF
and
, respectively.
The Oberbeck-Boussinesq approximation is employed
and the homogeneity and local thermal equilibrium in the
porous medium are assumed. We consider the porous
medium whose porosity is denoted by and permeability
by K. The Darcy velocity is denoted by v
. The follow-
ing four field equations embody the conservation of total
mass, momentum, thermal energy, and nano-particles,
respectively. The field variables are the Darcy velocity
v
,
the temperature T and the nano-particle volume fraction.
.v 0 V =
(1)
( ) ( ) ( ) { }
1 1
f
p f
v
P v T T g
t K
|
c
c
(
= V + +
c
(2)
( ) ( )
( )
2
m f
T
m B
p
T
c c v T
t
D
k T c D T T T
T
c
c
+ V =
c
(
V + V V + V V
(
(3)
Figure 1. Coordinate system and flow model.
2 2
1
T
B
D
v D T
t T
c
c
+ V = V + V
c
(4)
We write
( ) v u , v =
.
Here
f
, and are the density, viscosity and volu-
metric volume expansion coefficient of the fluid;
p
the density of the particles; g the gravitational accelera-
tion;
( )
m
c
the effective heat capacity and k
m
effective
thermal conductivity of the porous medium and D
B
the
Brownian diffusion coefficient and D
T
the thermopho-
retic diffusion coefficient. The flow is assumed to be
slow so that an advective term and a Forchheimer quad-
ratic drag term do not appear in the momentum equation.
The boundary conditions are taken to be
0 0
W W
v , T T , , at y , = = = = (5)
0 u , T T , , as y
= (6)
We consider the steady state flow. In keeping with the
Oberbeck-Boussinesq approximation and an assumption
that the nano-particle concentration is dilute, the mo-
mentum equation may be written as:
( )( ) ( ) ( )
0
1
P f f
P v
K
T T g
|
= V +
(
+
(7)
We now make the standard boundary layer approxi-
mation based on a scale analysis and write the governing
equations.
0
u v
x y
c c
+ =
c c
(8)
P
u
x K
c
=
c
(9)
( ) ( ) ( ) ( ) 1
f P f
P
g T T g
y
|
c
(
=
c
(10)
2
2 T
m B
D T T T T
u v T D
x y y y T y
o t
(
| || | c c c c c
+ = V + + (
| |
c c c c c
( \ . \ .
(11)
2 2
2 2
1
T
B
D T
u v D
x y T y y
c
| | | | c c c c
+ = +
| |
c c c c
\ . \ .
(12)
where
( )
( )
( )
p
m
m
f f
c
k
,
c c
c
o t
= =
(13)
One can eliminate P from Equations (9) and (10) by
cross-differentiation. At the same time one can introduce
a stream line function such that the continuity is auto-
matically satisfied:
R. S. R. GORLA ET AL.
Copyright 2011 SciRes. JMP
64
u , v
dy dx
c c
= =
(14)
We are then left with the following three equations.
( ) ( )
2
2
1
P f f
gK gK
T
x x y
|
c c c
= +
c c c
(15)
2
2 T
m B
D T T T T
T D
y x x y y y T y
o t
(
| || | c c c c c c c
= V + + (
| |
c c c c c c c
( \ . \ .
(16)
2 2
2 2
1
T
B
D T
D
y x x y T y y
c
| | | | c c c c c c
= +
| |
c c c c c c
\ . \ .
(17)
Proceeding with the analysis we introduce the follow-
ing dimensionless variables:
1
3
x
y
Ra
x
q =
( ) 1
f
x
m
gKAx
Ra
|
o
1 3 /
m x
S
Ra
o
=
W
T T
T T
u
W
f
(18)
We assume that T
w
and
are constants.
Substituting the expressions in Equation (18) into the
governing Equations (15)-(17) we obtain the following
transformed equations:
| |
2
0
3
r
S N f q u '' ' ' = (19)
( )
2 1
0
3
b t
S N f N u u u u '' ' ' ' ' + + + = (20)
1
0
3
t
e
b
N
f L S f
N
u '' ' '' + + = (21)
where the four parameters are defined as:
( )( )
( )( ) 1
P f W
r
f W
N
T T
|
=
,
( ) ( )
( )
B W
P
b
m
f
c D
N
c
c
o
= ,
( ) ( )
( )
T W
P
t
m
f
c D T T
N
c T
c
o
= ,
m
e
B
L
D
o
c
=
(22)
The transformed boundary conditions are:
0 0 1 1
0 0 0
: S , , f
: S , , f
q u
q u
= = = =
' = = =
(23)
The local friction factor may be written as
( )
0
2
2 0
2
y x
x
x
u
y
Ra .S"
Cf
Re .Pr U
=
| | c
|
c
\ .
= =
The heat transfer rate at the surface is given by:
0
W f
y
T
q k
y
=
| c
=
|
c
.
The heat transfer coefficient is given by:
( )
W
W
q
h
T T
Local Nusselt number is given by:
( )
1
3
0
x x
f
h x
Nu Ra ,
k
u
' = =
(24)
The mass transfer rate at the surface is given by:
( )
0
W m W
y
N D h
y
=
| c
= =
|
c
.
where
m
h = mass transfer coefficient,
The local Sherwood number is given by:
( )
1
3
0
m
x
h x
Sh Ra f ,
D
' = = (25)
3. Results and Discussion
3.1. Numerical Method
The system of Equations (19)-(21) with the boundary
conditions (23) is solved numerically by means of an
efficient, iterative, tri-diagonal implicit finite-difference
method discussed previously by Blottner [13]. Equations
(19)-(21) are discretized using three-point central differ-
ence formulae with S' replaced by another variable V.
The q direction is divided into 196 nodal points and a
variable step size is used to account for the sharp
changes in the variables in the region close to the surface
where viscous effects dominate. The initial step size used
is
1
0 001 . Aq = and the growth factor 1 037 K . = such
that
1 n n
K Aq Aq
= (where the subscript n is the number
of nodes minus one). This gives
max
q 35 which repre-
R. S. R. GORLA ET AL.
Copyright 2011 SciRes. JMP
65
sents the edge of the boundary layer at infinity. The or-
dinary differential equations are then converted into lin-
ear algebraic equations that are solved by the Thomas
algorithm discussed by Blottner [14]. Iteration is em-
ployed to deal with the nonlinear nature of the governing
equations. The convergence criterion employed in this
work was based on the relative difference between the
current and the previous iterations. When this difference
or error reached 10
-5
, the solution was assumed con-
verged and the iteration process was terminated.
Equations (19)-(21) were solved numerically to satisfy
the boundary conditions (23) for parametric values of Le,
Nr (buoyancy ratio number), Nb (Brownian motion pa-
rameter) and Nt (thermophoresis parameter) using finite
difference method. Tables 1-5 indicate results for wall
values for the gradients of velocity, temperature and
concentration functions which are proportional to the
friction factor, Nusselt number and Sherwood number,
respectively. From Tables 1-3, we notice that as Nr and
Nt increase, the friction factor increases whereas the heat
transfer rate (Nusselt number) and mass transfer rate
(Sherwood number) decrease. As Nb increases, the fric-
Table 1. Effects of N
r
on S"(0), '(0) and f'(0) for N
b
= 0.3,
N
t
= 0.1 and Le = 10.
N
r
S"(0) '(0) f'(0)
0 2.514805E-05 3.279025E-01 1.498672
0.1 8.547099E-05 3.263273E-01 1.484164
0.2 1.189362E-04 3.246233E-01 1.468161
0.3 2.209482E-04 3.224377E-01 1.452664
0.4
2.975905E-05
3.209329E-01 1.436392
0.5 1.645268E-04 3.185953E-01 1.419499
Table 2. Effects of N
t
on S"(0), '(0) and f'(0) for N
b
= 0.3,
N
r
= 0.5 and Le = 10.
N
t
S"(0) '(0) f'(0)
0.1 1.645268E-04 3.185953E-01 1.419499
0.2 1.337430E-07 3.052335E-01 1.416536
0.3 3.323112E-07 2.933325E-01 1.416866
0.4 3.482237E-05 2.817253E-01 1.421582
0.5 7.448123E-05 2.709439E-01 1.429226
Table 3. Effects of N
b
on S"(0), '(0) and f'(0) for N
r
=0.5,
N
t
=0.1 and Le=10.
N
b
S"(0) '(0) f'(0)
0.1 -5.269319E-06 3.679768E-01 1.327454
0.2 5.612235E-05 3.433554E-01 1.393615
0.3 1.645268E-04 3.185953E-01 1.419499
0.4
2.058221E-05
2.942436E-01 1.435464
0.5 1.521388E-04 2.724658E-01 1.447720
Table 4. Effects of Le on S"(0), '(0) and f'(0) for N
b
=0.3,
N
r
= 0.5, and N
t
= 0.1.
Le S"(0) '(0) f'(0)
1 9.363982E-05 2.782226E-01 2.825313E-01
10 1.645268E-04 3.185953E-01 1.419499
100 -2.860076E-04 3.123462E-01 4.712465
1000 -5.822286E-04 3.077888E-01 15.029030
Table 5. Effects of Le on S"(0), '(0) and f'(0) for N
b
= 0,
N
r
= 0, and N
t
= 0.
Le S"(0) '(0) f'(0)
1 1.871019E-04 4.303957E-01 4.303957E-01
10 1.871019E-04 4.303957E-01 1.483679
100 1.871019E-04 4.303957E-01 4.732183
1000 1.871019E-04 4.303957E-01 14.978180
tion factor and surface mass transfer rates increase
whereas the surface heat transfer rate decreases. Results
from Table 4 indicate that as Le increases, the heat and
mass transfer rates increase. From Table 5, we observe
that the nano fluids display drag reducing and heat and
mass transfer rate reducing characteristics.
Figures 2-4 indicate that as Nr increases, the velocity
decreases and the temperature and concentration increase.
Similar effects are observed from Figures 5-10 as Nt and
Nb vary.
Figure 11 illustrates the variation of velocity within the
boundary layer as Le increases. The velocity increases as
Le increases. From Figures 12 and 13, we ob- serve that
as Le increases, the temperature and concentration within
the boundary layer decrease and the thermal and concen-
tration boundary later thicknesses decrease.
The influence of nanoparticles on natural convection is
modeled by accounting for Brownian motion and ther-
mophoresis as well as non-isothermal boundary condi-
tions. The thickness of the boundary layer for the mass
fraction is smaller than the thermal boundary layer
thickness for Large values of Lewis number Le. The
contribution of N
t
to heat and mass transfer does not de-
pend on the value of Le. The Brownian motion and
thermophoresis of nano particles increases the effective
thermal conductivity of the nanofluid. Both Brownian
diffusion and thermophoresis give rise to cross diffusion
terms that are similar to the familiar Soret and Dufour
cross diffusion terms that arise with a binary fluid dis-
cussed by Lakshmi Narayana et al. [15].
4. Concluding Remarks
In this paper, we presented a boundary layer analysis for
the natural convection past a non-isothermal vertical
R. S. R. GORLA ET AL.
Copyright 2011 SciRes. JMP
0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8
0. 0
0. 2
0. 4
0. 6
0. 8
1. 0
1. 2
N
r
=0, 0. 1, 0. 2, 0. 3, 0. 4, 0. 5
N
b
=0. 3
N
t
=0. 1
Le=10
S
'
q
Figure 2. Effects of N
r
on velocity profiles.
0 1 2 3 4 5 6
0. 00
0. 25
0. 50
0. 75
1. 00
N
b
=0. 3
N
t
=0. 1
Le=10
N
r
=0, 0. 1, 0. 2, 0. 3, 0. 4, 0. 5
u
q
Figure 3. Effects of N
r
on temperature profiles.
0. 0 0. 5 1. 0 1. 5 2. 0 2. 5 3. 0
0. 00
0. 25
0. 50
0. 75
1. 00
N
b
=0. 3
N
t
=0. 1
Le=10
N
r
=0, 0. 1, 0. 2, 0. 3, 0. 4, 0. 5
f
q
Figure 4. Effects of N
r
on volume fraction profiles.
R. S. R. GORLA ET AL.
Copyright 2011 SciRes. JMP
67
0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8
0. 0
0. 2
0. 4
0. 6
0. 8
1. 0
1. 2
N
b
=0. 3
N
r
=0. 5
Le=10
N
t
=0. 1, 0. 2, 0. 3, 0. 4, 0. 5
S
'
q
Figure 5. Effects of N
t
on velocity profiles.
0 1 2 3 4 5 6
0. 00
0. 25
0. 50
0. 75
1. 00
N
b
=0. 3
N
r
=0. 5
Le=10
N
t
=0. 1, 0. 2, 0. 3, 0. 4, 0. 5
u
q
Figure 6. Effects of N
t
on temperature profiles.
0 1 2 3 4 5
0. 00
0. 25
0. 50
0. 75
1. 00
N
b
=0. 3
N
r
=0. 5
Le=10
N
t
=0. 1, 0. 2, 0. 3, 0. 4, 0. 5
f
q
Figure 7. Effects of N
t
on volume fraction profiles.
R. S. R. GORLA ET AL.
Copyright 2011 SciRes. JMP
68
0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8
0. 0
0. 2
0. 4
0. 6
0. 8
1. 0
1. 2
N
r
=0. 5
N
t
=0. 1
Le=10
N
b
=0. 1, 0. 2, 0. 3, 0. 4, 0. 5
S
'
q
Figure 8. Effects of N
b
on velocity profiles.
0 1 2 3 4 5 6
0. 00
0. 25
0. 50
0. 75
1. 00
N
r
=0. 5
N
t
=0. 1
Le=10
N
b
=0. 1, 0. 2, 0. 3, 0. 4, 0. 5
u
q
Figure 9. Effects of N
b
on temperature profiles.
0 1 2 3 4
0. 00
0. 25
0. 50
0. 75
1. 00
N
r
=0. 5
N
t
=0. 1
Le=10
N
b
=0. 1, 0. 2, 0. 3, 0. 4, 0. 5
f
q
Figure 10. Effects of N
b
on volume fraction profiles.
R. S. R. GORLA ET AL.
Copyright 2011 SciRes. JMP
69
0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8
0. 0
0. 2
0. 4
0. 6
0. 8
1. 0
1. 2
Le=100, 1000
Le=10
N
b
=0. 3
N
r
=0. 5
N
t
=0. 1
Le=1
S
'
q
Figure 11. Effects of Le on velocity profiles.
0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8
0. 00
0. 25
0. 50
0. 75
1. 00
N
b
=0. 3
N
r
=0. 5
N
t
=0. 1
Le=1, 10, 100, 1000
u
q
Figure 12. Effects of Le on temperature profiles.
0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10
0. 00
0. 25
0. 50
0. 75
1. 00
N
b
=0. 3
N
r
=0. 5
N
t
=0. 1
Le=1, 10, 100, 1000
f
q
Figure 13. Effects of Le on volume fraction profiles.
R. S. R. GORLA ET AL.
Copyright 2011 SciRes. JMP
plate in a porous medium saturated with a nano fluid.
Numerical results for friction factor, surface heat transfer
rate and mass transfer rate have been presented for pa-
rametric variations of the buoyancy ratio parameter Nr,
Brownian motion parameter Nb, thermophoresis pa-
rameter Nt and Lewis number Le. The results indicate
that as Nr and Nt increase, the friction factor increases
whereas the heat transfer rate (Nusselt number) and mass
transfer rate (Sherwood number) decrease. As Nb in-
creases, the friction factor and surface mass transfer rates
increase whereas the surface heat transfer rate decreases.
As Le increases, the heat and mass transfer rates increase.
Nano fluids display drag reducing and heat and mass
transfer rate reducing characteristics.
5. References
[1] J. A. Eastman, S. U. S. Choi, S. Li, W. Yu and L. J.
Thompson, Anomalously Increased Effective Thermal
Conductivities Containing Copper Nanoparticles, Ap-
plied Physics Letters, Vol. 78, No. 6, 2001, pp. 718-720.
doi:10.1063/1.1341218
[2] S. U. S. Choi, Z. G. Zhang, W. Yu, F. E. Lockwood and
E. A. Grulke, Anomalous Thermal Conductivity En-
hancement on Nanotube Suspensions, Applied Physics
Letters, Vol. 79, No. 14, 2001, pp. 2252-2254.
doi:10.1063/1.1408272
[3] H. E. Patel, S. K. Das, T. Sundararajan, A. Sreekumaran,
B. George and T. Pradeep, Thermal Conductivities of
Naked and Monolayer Protected Metal Nanoparticle
Based Nanofluids: Manifestation of Anomalous En-
hancement and Chemical Effects, Applied Physics Let-
ters, Vol. 14, No. 83, 2003, pp. 2931-2933.
doi:10.1063/1.1602578
[4] S. M. You, J. H. Kim and K. H. Kim, Effect of
Nanoparticles on Critical Heat Flux of Water in Pool
Boiling Heat Transfer, Applied Physics Letters, Vol. 83,
No. 16, 2003, pp. 3374-3376.
doi:10.1063/1.1619206
[5] P. Vassallo, R. Kumar and S. DAmico, Pool Boiling
Heat Transfer Experiments in Silica-Water Nanofluids,
International Journal of Heat and Mass Transfer, Vol. 47,
No. 2, 2004, pp. 407-411.
doi:10.1016/S0017-9310(03)00361-2
[6] P. Cheng and W. J. Minkowycz, Free Convection about
a Vertical Flat Plate Embedded in a Saturated Porous
Medium with Applications to Heat Transfer from a
Dike, Journal of Geophysics Res., Vol. 82, 1977, pp.
2040-2044.
doi:10.1029/JB082i014p02040
[7] R. S. R. Gorla and R. Tornabene, Free Convection from
a Vertical Plate with Nonuniform Surface Heat Flux and
Embedded in a Porous Medium, Transport in Porous
Media Journal, Vol. 3, 1988, pp. 95-106.
doi:10.1007/BF00222688
[8] R. S. R. Gorla and A. Zinolabedini, Free Convection
From a Vertical Plate With Nonuniform Surface Tem-
perature and Embedded in a Porous Medium, Journal of
Energy Resources Technology, Vol. 109, 1987, pp. 26-30.
doi:10.1115/1.3231319
[9] H. T. Chen and C. K. Chen, Natural Convection of
Non-Newtonian Fluids about a Horizontal Surface in a
Porous Medium, Journal of Energy Resources Technol-
ogy, Vol. 109, 1987, pp. 119-123.
doi:10.1115/1.3231336
[10] K. N. Mehta and K. N. Rao, Buoyancy-Induced Flow of
Non-Newtonian Fluids in a Porous Medium Past a Hori-
zontal Plate with Nonuniform Surface Heat Flux, Inter-
national Journal of Engineering Science, Vol. 32, 1994,
pp. 297-302.
[11] A. Nakayama and H. Koyama, Buoyancy-Induced Flow
of Non-Newtonian Fluids Over a Non-Isothermal Body
of Arbitrary Shape in a Fluid-Saturated Porous Medium,
Applied Scientific Research, Vol. 48, 1991, pp. 55-70.
doi:10.1007/BF01998665
[12] D. A. Nield and A. V. Kuznetsov, The Cheng Min-
kowycz Problem for Natural Convective Boundary Layer
Flow in a Porous Medium Saturated by a Nanofluid,
International Journal of Heat and Mass Transfer, Vol. 52,
2009, pp. 5792-5795.
doi:10.1016/j.ijheatmasstransfer.2009.07.024
[13] D. A. Nield and A. V. Kuznetsov, Thermal Instability in
a Porous Medium Layer Saturated by a Nanofluid,
International Journal of Heat and Mass Transfer, Vol. 52,
No. 25-26, 2009, pp. 5796-5801.
doi:10.1016/j.ijheatmasstransfer.2009.07.023
[14] F. G. Blottner, Finite-Difference Methods of Solution of
the Boundary-Layer Equations, Journal of AIAA, Vol. 8,
1970, pp. 193-205.
doi:10.2514/3.5642
[15] P. A. L. Narayana, P. V. S. N. Murthy and R. S. R. Gorla,
Soret-Driven Thermosolutal Convection Induced by In-
clined Thermal and Solutal Gradients in a Shallow Hori-
zontal Layer of a Porous Medium, Journal of Fluid Me-
chanics, Vol. 612, 2008, pp. 1-19.
doi:10.1017/S0022112008002619
R. S. R. GORLA ET AL.
Copyright 2011 SciRes. JMP
71
Nomenclature
D
B
Brownian diffusion coefficient
D
T
thermophoretic diffusion coefficient
f rescaled nano-particle volume fraction
g gravitational acceleration vector
k
m
effective thermal conductivity of the porous medium
K permeability of porous medium
Le Lewis number
Nr Buoyancy Ratio
Nb Brownian motion parameter
Nt thermophoresis parameter
Nu Nusselt number
P pressure
q wall heat flux
Ra
x
local Rayleigh number
Re Reynolds number
S dimensionless stream function
T temperature
T
W
wall temperature of the vertical plate
T
ambient temperature
U reference velocity
u, v Darcy velocity components
(x,y) Cartesian coordinates
Greek Symbols:
m
thermal diffusivity of porous medium
volumetric expansion coefficient of fluid
porosity
dimensionless distance
dimensionless temperature
viscosity of fluid
f
fluid density
p
nano-particle mass density
(c)
f
heat capacity of the fluid
(c)
m
effective heat capacity of porous medium
(c)
p
effective heat capacity of nano-particle material
parameter defined by equation (13)
nano-particle volume fraction
W
nano-particle volume fraction at the wall of the vertical plate
ambient nano-particle volume fraction
stream function