CFD analysis of natural convection heat transfer in a square cavity with partitions utilizing Al2O3 nanofluid

Abstract

In the present study, natural convective heat transfer in a partitioned square cavity utilizing nanofluids is studied. The vertical left and right walls are considered as the hot and cold walls, respectively and the partitions assumed to be adiabatic. The nanofluid used in this study is Al₂O₃ with the volume fraction of 20%. It is assumed that nanofluid is a single phase fluid. FLUENT 6.3.26 is used to simulate the problem. The influence of different parameters such as Rayleigh number (Ra=10⁵ and 10⁷), height of partition (h=0.1, 0.3, 0.5H) at a fixed distance from the walls (d=0.3H) are studied. According to the results, Rayleigh number and height of the partition are important factors that extremely affect the streamlines and isotherms. At Ra=10⁷, the flow is confined in the distance between walls and partitions. Furthermore, at high partitions, the isotherms are horizontal between two partitions. For a fixed amount of the partition height, Nusselt number increases as the Rayleigh number rises. On the other hand, for a fixed Rayleigh, with the increasing partition height, Nusselt number decreases along the hot wall.