Numerical studies on conjugate free convection in baffle attached square enclosure using al2o3 water nanofluid

Abstract

Natural convection is considered as a preferable heat transfer method wherever possible due to its easiness and cost effectiveness. Natural convection in enclosures has many engineering applications such as cooling systems of electronic components, solar collectors, thermal storage systems and nuclear reactor systems. Thermal management of electronics equipment is an active area of research in consideration of the fact that heat to be dissipated in electronic components has gone up many folds. The heat generated by electronic components must be removed to prevent failure and improve the longevity of the components. Application of active cooling techniques is limited because of the additional design considerations resulting in higher operating costs. The cooling by natural convection is considered as one of the most effective and efficient cooling mechanisms. In such natural convection circumstances, employing traditional fluids such as air, water, ethylene glycol or mineral oils as cooling medium is not reliable due to their low thermal conductivity and hence poor cooling performance. Thus improvement of the thermal characteristics of the working fluid is a demanding task. Nanotechnology offers a solution. A nanofluid is the suspension of nanoparticles in a base fluid like water. Nanofluids are promising fluids for heat transfer enhancement due to their anomalously high thermal performance. newlineEnclosures having thin baffles assume that the baffle has infinite thermal conductivity and hence the temperature of the baffle is assumed to be constant throughout the length. However, in real applications, any baffle material has finite thermal conductivity causing conjugate heat transfer between baffle and fluid. newline