The effects of combined horizontal and vertical heterogeneity on the onset of convection in a porous medium

The effects of hydrodynamic and thermal heterogeneity, for the case of variation in both the horizontal and vertical directions, on the onset of convection in a horizontal layer of a saturated porous medium uniformly heated from below, are studied analytically for the case of weak heterogeneity. It is found that the effect of such heterogeneity on the critical value of the Rayleigh number Ra based on mean properties is of second order if the properties vary in a piecewise constant or linear fashion. The effects of horizontal heterogeneity and vertical heterogeneity are then comparable once the aspect ratio is taken into account, and to a first approximation are independent. For the case of conducting impermeable top and bottom boundaries and a square box, the effects of permeability heterogeneity and conductivity heterogeneity each cause a reduction in the critical value of Ra, while for the case of a tall box there can be either a reduction or an increase.     

The effects of combined horizontal and vertical heterogeneity on the onset of convection in a porous medium: Moderate heterogeneity

The effects of hydrodynamic and thermal heterogeneity, for the case of variation in both the horizontal and vertical directions, on the onset of convection in a horizontal layer of a saturated porous medium uniformly heated from below, are now studied analytically for the case of moderate heterogeneity (rather than the weak heterogeneity previously studied), for the case of a square box where the properties vary in a piecewise constant or linear fashion, with conducting impermeable top and bottom boundaries and insulating impermeable sidewalls. In order to allow for the moderate heterogeneity the order of the Galerkin expansion employed has been increased, and the expansion of a determinant of high order has been avoided by the use of a least squares methodology to find the critical value of the Rayleigh number Ra. It is found that the effects of permeability heterogeneity and conductivity heterogeneity each cause a reduction in the critical value of Ra in all cases, and the effects of horizontal and vertical heterogeneity are still approximately additive.     

Free convection of composite porous medium in a vertical channel

A fully developed free convection flow of immiscible fluids in a vertical channel filled with a porous medium is analyzed in the presence of source/sink. The flow is modeled using the Darcy–Brinkman–Forchheimer equation model. The viscous and Darcy dissipation terms are included in the energy equation. The channel walls are maintained at two different constant temperatures. The transport properties of both fluids are assumed to be constant. Continuous conditions for velocity, temperature, shear stress, and heat flux of both fluids at the interface are employed. The resulting coupled nonlinear equations are solved analytically using regular perturbation method and numerically using finite difference method. The velocity and temperature profiles are obtained in terms of porous parameter, Grashof number, viscosity ratio, width ratio, conductivity ratio, and heat generation or heat absorption coefficient. It is found that the presence of porous matrix and heat absorption reduces the flow field. © 2011 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Heat Trans Asian Res; Published online in Wiley Online Library ( wileyonlinelibrary.com/journal/htj ). DOI 10.1002/htj.20340     

The effect of combined vertical and horizontal heterogeneity on the onset of convection in a bidisperse porous medium

The effects of both horizontal and vertical hydrodynamic and thermal heterogeneity, on the onset of convection in a horizontal layer of a saturated bidisperse porous medium uniformly heated from below, are studied analytically using linear stability theory for the case of weak heterogeneity. It is found that the effect of such heterogeneity on the critical value of the Rayleigh number Ra based on mean properties is of second order if the properties vary in a piecewise constant or linear fashion. The effects of horizontal heterogeneity and vertical heterogeneity are then comparable once the aspect ratio is taken into account, and to a first approximation are independent. The thermal heterogeneity of the p-phase can be quite significant when the thermal diffusivity of that phase is large relative to that of the f-phase.     

Thermal instability in a porous medium layer saturated by a nanofluid

The onset of convection in a horizontal layer of a porous medium saturated by a nanofluid is studied analytically. The model used for the nanofluid incorporates the effects of Brownian motion and thermophoresis. The analysis reveals that for a typical nanofluid (with large Lewis number) the prime effect of the nanofluids is via a buoyancy effect coupled with the conservation of nanoparticles, the contribution of nanoparticles to the thermal energy equation being a second-order effect. It is found that the critical thermal Rayleigh number can be reduced or increased by a substantial amount, depending on whether the basic nanoparticle distribution is top-heavy or bottom-heavy, by the presence of the nanoparticles. Oscillatory instability is possible in the case of a bottom-heavy nanoparticle distribution.     

Unsteady effects on natural convective heat transfer through porous media in cavity due to top surface partial convection

Numerical investigations of transient natural convection flow through a fluid-saturated porous medium in a rectangular cavity with a convection surface condition were conducted. Physical problem consists of a rectangular cavity filled with porous medium. The cavity is insulated except the top wall that is partially exposed to an outside ambient. The exposed surface allows convective transport through the porous medium, generating a thermal stratification and flow circulations. The formulation of differential equations is non-dimensionalized and then solved numerically under appropriate initial and boundary conditions using the finite difference method. The finite different equation handling the boundary condition of the open top surface is derived. The two-dimensional flow is characterized mainly by two symmetrical vortices driven by the effect of buoyancy. A lateral temperature gradient in the region close to the top wall induces the buoyancy force under an unstable condition. Unsteady effects of associated parameters were examined. It was found that the heat transfer coefficient, Rayleigh number and Darcy number considerably influenced characteristics of flow and heat transfer mechanisms. Furthermore, the flow pattern is found to have a local effect on the heat convection rate.     

Double diffusive convection of a micropolar fluid saturated in a sparsely packed porous medium

This study examines the double diffusive convection of a sparsely packed micropolar fluid‐saturated porous medium by using a linear stability analysis. The Darcy–Brinkman–Forchheimer model is employed for the porous fluid layer. The stability criterion is sought analytically with the simple free‐free, iso‐thermal, and iso‐solutal boundary conditions. The dependence of stationary or oscillatory convection on the porous parameter, Lewis number, solutal Rayleigh number, and parameters involved in micropolar fluids is drawn and discussed. The results show that the critical wave number is found to be insensitive to the variation of governing parameters except for the porous parameter. © 2013 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Heat Trans Asian Res; Published online in Wiley Online Library (wileyonlinelibrary.com/journal/htj). DOI 10.1002/htj.21052     

Soret and Dufour effects on natural convection heat and mass transfer from a vertical cone in a porous medium

This work studies the Soret and Dufour effects on the boundary layer flow due to natural convection heat and mass transfer over a downward-pointing vertical cone in a porous medium saturated with Newtonian fluids with constant wall temperature and concentration. A similarity analysis is performed, and the obtained similar equations are solved by cubic spline collocation method. The effects of the Dufour parameter, Soret parameter, Lewis number, and buoyancy ratio on the heat and mass transfer characteristics have been studied. The local Nusselt number tends to decrease as the Dufour parameter is increased. The effect of the Dufour parameter on the local Nusselt number becomes more significant as the Lewis number is increased. Moreover, an increase in the Soret number leads to a decrease in the local Sherwood number and an increase in the local Nusselt number.     

Numerical simulation of mixed convection in a porous medium filled with water/Al2 O3 nanofluid

The present work encloses the application of a Brinkman–extended Darcy model in a problem concerning mixed convection ina lid–driven porous cavity using nanofluids. The transport equations are solved numerically by the finite volume method on a co–located grid arrangement using the Quadratic Upstream Interpolation for Convective Kinematics (QUICK) scheme. The effects of governing parameters, namely, Grashof number (Gr), Darcy number (Da), and solid volume fraction $(\chi )$ , on the streamlines and the isotherms are studied. The present results are validated by favorable comparisons with previously published results and are in good agreement with them. The present numerical results show that the addition of nanoparticles to a base fluid has produced an augmentation of the heat transfer coefficient and it is found to increase significantly with an increase of the particle volume concentration. It is observed from the results that at the higher value of the Grashof number (Gr = 10⁴ ), the average Nusselt number increases with an increase in the Darcy number for a constant solid volume fraction. The detailed results are reported by means of streamlines, isotherms, and Nusselt numbers. © 2012 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Heat Trans Asian Res; Published online in Wiley Online Library ( wileyonlinelibrary.com/journal/htj ). DOI 10.1002/htj.21029     

Natural convection of non-Newtonian fluids through permeable axisymmetric and two-dimensional bodies in a porous medium

The present work concerns the natural convection of non-Newtonian power-law fluids with or without yield stress over the permeable two-dimensional or axisymmetric bodies of arbitrary shape in a fluid-saturated porous medium. Using the fourth-order Runge-Kutta scheme method and shooting method we obtain the local non-similarity solutions. The parameters that include the dimensionless yield stress Ω, permeable constant c and power index n are studied, and the heat flux and the wall temperature are taken into consideration as variables. The local non-similarity solutions are found to be in excellent agreement with the exact solution. It is found that the results depend strongly on the values of the yield stress parameter, the wall temperature distributions, the lateral mass flux rate, and the heat flux at the boundary.     

The Cheng–Minkowycz problem for natural convective boundary-layer flow in a porous medium saturated by a nanofluid

The Cheng–Minkowycz problem of natural convection past a vertical plate, in a porous medium saturated by a nanofluid, is studied analytically. The model used for the nanofluid incorporates the effects of Brownian motion and thermophoresis. For the porous medium the Darcy model is employed. A similarity solution is presented. This solution depends on a Lewis number Le, a buoyancy-ratio number Nr, a Brownian motion number Nb, and a thermophoresis number Nt. The dependency of the Nusslelt number on these four parameters is investigated.     

Non—Darcian and Anisotropic Effects on Natural Convection in Horizontal Porous Media Enclosure

Natural convection heat transfer in a horizontal enclosure filled with anisotropic porous media,being isothermally heated at bettom and cooled at top while the vertical walls being adiabatic,is numerically studied by applying the Brinkman model-a modified form of Darcy model giving consideratioin to the viscous effect.The results show that:(1)a larger permeability ratio(K^*) causes a lower flow intensity in the enclosure and a smaller Nusselt number,all Nusselt numbers approach unity in the limit of K^*→∞;a larger thermal conductivity ratio(λ^*) causes a stranger distortion of isotherms in the enclosure and a higher flow velocity near the walls,all the Nusselt numbers approach unity in the limit of λ^*-→0,the permeability and thermal conductivity ratios generally have opposing effects on the Nusselt number.(2) an increasing Darcy number decreases the flow intensity and heat tansfer rates,which is more significant at a lower permeability ratio.In particular,with K^*≤0.25,the Nusselt number for Da=10^-3 would differ from that of Darcy flow up to an amount of 30%,an analysis neglecting the non-Darican effect will inevitably be of considerable error.     

Free convection in a square cavity filled with a bidisperse porous medium

The classical problem of steady Darcy free convection in a square cavity filled with a porous medium has been extended to the case of a bidisperse porous medium (BDPM) by following the recent model proposed by Nield and Kuznetsov [D.A. Nield, A.V. Kuznetsov, Natural convection about a vertical plate embedded in a bidisperse porous medium, Int. J. Heat Mass Transfer 51 (2008) 1658–1664] and Rees et al. [D.A.S. Rees, D.A. Nield, A.V. Kuznetsov, Vertical free convective boundary-layer flow in a bidisperse porous medium, ASME J. Heat Transfer 130 (2008) 1–9]. The transformed partial differential equations in terms of the dimensionless stream function and temperature are solved numerically using a finite-difference method for some values of the governing parameters when the Rayleigh number Ra is equal to 10² and 10³. Results are presented for the flow field with streamlines, temperature field by isotherms and heat transfer by local and mean Nusselt numbers are presented for both the f- and p-phases. It is found that the most important parameters that influence the fluid flow and heat transfer are the inter-phase heat transfer parameter H and the modified thermal conductivity ratio parameter γ.     

Doubly diffusive unsteady mixed convection flow over a vertical plate embedded in a porous medium

The unsteady laminar incompressible boundary layer mixed convection flow over a semi-infinite vertical plate with a magnetic field situated in a porous medium has been studied where the buoyancy forces result both from temperature and concentration gradients. The effects of the presence of an isotropic solid matrix and dissipation have been included in the analysis. The governing coupled nonlinear partial differential equations with three independent variables have been solved numerically using an implicit finite-difference scheme in combination with the quasilinearization technique. The effects of the permeability of the medium, magnetic field and dissipation on the skin friction, heat transfer and mass transfer are found to be more pronounced for large value of the streamwise distance. Also, for assisting flow, the skin friction, heat transfer and mass transfer increase with the buoyancy forces, but the effect is exactly opposite for opposing flow.     

Cross–diffusion effects on mixed convection from an exponentially stretching surface in non–Darcy porous medium

The Soret and Dufour effects on mixed convection flow and heat and mass transfers from an exponentially stretching surface in a quiescent fluid–saturated non–Darcy porous medium is studied. Stretching velocity, wall temperature, and wall concentration are assumed to have specific exponential function forms. The governing partial differential equations are transformed into ordinary differential equations using similarity transformations and then solved numerically using an implicit finite difference scheme known as the Keller–box method. The present results are found to be in excellent agreement with previously published work on various special cases of the problem. The influence of buoyancy, Soret and Dufour numbers, and Darcy and non–Darcy parameters on the convective transport in the boundary layer region is analyzed. Also, the numerical values of the skin friction, heat, and mass transfer coefficients for different values of governing parameters are also tabulated. © 2013 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Heat Trans Asian Res; Published online in Wiley Online Library ( wileyonlinelibrary.com/journal/htj ). DOI 10.1002/htj.21032     

Soret and Dufour effects on free convection boundary layers over an inclined wavy surface in a porous medium

This work studies the heat and mass transfer characteristics of natural convection near a vertical wavy cone in a fluid saturated porous medium with Soret and Dufour effects. The surface of the wavy cone is kept at constant temperature and concentration. The governing equations are transformed into a set of coupled differential equations, and the obtained boundary layer equations are solved by the cubic spline collocation method. The heat and mass transfer characteristics are presented as functions of Soret parameter, Dufour parameter, half angle of the cone, Lewis number, buoyancy ratio, and dimensionless amplitude. Results show that an increase in the Dufour parameter tends to decrease the local Nusselt number, and an increase in the Soret parameter tends to decrease the local Sherwood number. Moreover, a greater half angle of the cone leads to a greater fluctuation of the local Nusselt and Sherwood numbers with the streamwise coordinates.     

Free convection of non-Newtonian nanofluids about a vertical truncated cone in a porous medium

This work studies the free convection heat transfer over a truncated cone embedded in a porous medium saturated by a non-Newtonian power-law nanofluid with constant wall temperature and constant wall nanoparticle volume fraction. The effects of Brownian motion and thermophoresis are incorporated into the model for nanofluids. A coordinate transformation is performed, and the obtained nonsimilar equations are solved by the cubic spline collocation method. The effects of the power-law index, Brownian motion parameter, thermophoresis parameter and buoyancy ratio on the temperature, nanoparticle volume fraction and velocity profiles are discussed. The reduced Nusselt numbers are plotted as functions of the power-law index, thermophoresis parameter, Brownian parameter, Lewis number, and buoyancy ratio. Results show that increasing the thermophoresis parameter or the Brownian parameter tends to decrease the reduced Nusselt number. Moreover, the reduced Nusselt number increases as the power-law index is increased.     

Natural convection and its fractal for liquid freezing in a vertical cavity filled with porous medium

The numerical simulation for a freezing liquid-saturated porous media in a vertical cylindrical cavity under the third kind of thermal boundary condition is reported in this paper. It shows that the effect of natural convection in the liquid phase decreases the freezing layer thickness and the freezing front has a wave shape instead of a stable plane, with one or more pair of eddy cells. This indicates a fractal existence. © 1999 Scripta Technica, Heat Trans Asian Res, 28(3): 165–171, 1999     

Effects of a porous medium on the accelerated flow past a vertical porous surface

In the present work we investigate the effects of a porous medium on the accelerated flow past a vertical porous limiting surface. The solution of the problem is obtained in closed form by using the Laplace transform technique.