Convective heat and mass transfer in boundary layer flow through porous media saturated with nanofluids.

Abstract

The thesis is devoted to the study of flow, heat and mass transfer processes, and crossdiffusion effects in convective boundary layer flows through porous media saturated with nanofluids. Of particular interest is how nanofluids perform as heat transfer fluids compared to traditional fluids such as oil and water. Flow in different geometries and subject to various source terms is investigated. An important aspect of the study and understanding of transport processes is the solution of the highly non-linear coupled differential equations that model both the flow and the heat transportation. In the literature, various analytical and numerical methods are available for finding solutions to fluid flow equations. However, not all these methods give accurate solutions, are stable, or are computationally efficient. For these reasons, it is important to constantly devise numerical schemes that work more efficiently, including improving the performance of existing schemes, to achieve accuracy with less computational effort. In this thesis the systems of differential equations that describe the fluid flow and other transport processes were solved numerically using both established and recent numerical schemes such as the spectral relaxation method and the spectral quasilinearization method. These spectral methods have been used only in a limited number of studies. There is therefore the need to test and prove the accuracy and general application of the methods in a wider class of boundary value problems. The accuracy, convergence, and validity of the solutions obtained using spectral methods, have been established by careful comparison with solutions for limiting cases in the published literature, or by use of a different solution method. In terms of understanding the physically important variables that impact the flow, we have inter alia, investigated the significance of different fluid and physical parameters, and how changes in these parameters affect the skin friction coefficient, the heat and mass transfer rates and the fluid properties. Some system parameters of interest in this study include the nanoparticle volume fraction, the Hartmann number, thermal radiation, Brownian motion, the heat generation, the Soret and Dufour effects, and the Prandtl and Schmidt number. The dependency of the heat, mass transfer and skin friction coefficients on these parameters has been quantified and discussed. In this thesis, we show that nanofluids have a significant impact on heat and mass transfer processes compared with traditional heat transfer fluids.