Numerical study of forced and free convective boundary layer flow of a magnetic fluid over a flat plate under the action of a localized magnetic field

The two-dimensional, steady, laminar, forced and free convective boundary layer flow of a magnetic fluid over a semi-infinite vertical plate, under the action of a localized magnetic field, is numerically studied. The magnetic fluid is considered to be water-based with temperature dependent viscosity and thermal conductivity. The study of the boundary layer is separated into two cases. In case I the boundary layer is studied near the leading edge, where it is dominated by the large viscous forces, whereas in case II the boundary layer is studied far from the leading edge of the plate where the effects of buoyancy forces increase. The numerical solution, for these two different cases, is obtained by an efficient numerical technique based on the common finite difference method. Numerical calculations are carried out for the value of Prandl number Pr =  49.832 (water-based magnetic fluid) and for different values of the dimensionless parameters entering into the problem and especially for the magnetic parameter Mn, the viscosity/temperature parameter Θ _r and the thermal/conductivity parameter S*. The analysis of the obtained results show that the flow field is influenced by the application of the magnetic field as well as by the variation of the viscosity and the thermal conductivity of the fluid with temperature. It is hoped that they could be interesting for engineering applications.     

Group method analysis of combined heat and mass transfer by MHD non-Darcy non-Newtonian natural convection adjacent to horizontal cylinder in a saturated porous medium

The group theoretic method is applied for solving problem of combined magneto-hydrodynamic heat and mass transfer of non-Darcy natural convection about an impermeable horizontal cylinder in a non-Newtonian power law fluid embedded in porous medium under coupled thermal and mass diffusion, inertia resistance, magnetic field, thermal radiation effects. The application of one-parameter groups reduces the number of independent variables by one and consequently, the system of governing partial differential equations with the boundary conditions reduces to a system of ordinary differential equations with appropriate boundary conditions. The ordinary differential equations are solved numerically for the velocity using shooting method. The effects of magnetic parameter M, Ergun number Er, power law (viscosity) index n, buoyancy ratio N, radiation parameter R_d, Prandtl number Pr and Lewis number Le on the velocity, temperature fields within the boundary layer, heat and mass transfer are presented graphically and discussed.     

Combined effect of magnetic field and heat absorption on unsteady free convection and heat transfer flow in a micropolar fluid past a semi-infinite moving plate with viscous dissipation using element free Galerkin method

The fully developed electrically conducting micropolar fluid flow and heat transfer along a semi-infinite vertical porous moving plate is studied including the effect of viscous heating and in the presence of a magnetic field applied transversely to the direction of the flow. The Darcy-Brinkman-Forchheimer model which includes the effects of boundary and inertia forces is employed. The differential equations governing the problem have been transformed by a similarity transformation into a system of non-dimensional differential equations which are solved numerically by element free Galerkin method. Profiles for velocity, microrotation and temperature are presented for a wide range of plate velocity, viscosity ratio, Darcy number, Forchhimer number, magnetic field parameter, heat absorption parameter and the micropolar parameter. The skin friction and Nusselt numbers at the plates are also shown graphically. The present problem has significant applications in chemical engineering, materials processing, solar porous wafer absorber systems and metallurgy.     

The effect of variable viscosity on MHD viscoelastic fluid flow and heat transfer over a stretching sheet

An analysis has been carried out to study the momentum and heat transfer characteristics in an incompressible electrically conducting non-Newtonian boundary layer flow of a viscoelastic fluid over a stretching sheet. The partial differential equations governing the flow and heat transfer characteristics are converted into highly non-linear coupled ordinary differential equations by similarity transformations. The effect of variable fluid viscosity, Magnetic parameter, Prandtl number, variable thermal conductivity, heat source/sink parameter and thermal radiation parameter are analyzed for velocity, temperature fields, and wall temperature gradient. The resultant coupled highly non-linear ordinary differential equations are solved numerically by employing a shooting technique with fourth order Runge–Kutta integration scheme. The fluid viscosity and thermal conductivity, respectively, assumed to vary as an inverse and linear function of temperature. The analysis reveals that the wall temperature profile decreases significantly due to increase in magnetic field parameter. Further, it is noticed that the skin friction of the sheet decreases due to increase in the Magnetic parameter of the flow characteristics.     

Heat transfer in a liquid film over an unsteady stretching surface with viscous dissipation in presence of external magnetic field

This paper presents a mathematical analysis of MHD flow and heat transfer to a laminar liquid film from a horizontal stretching surface. The flow of a thin fluid film and subsequent heat transfer from the stretching surface is investigated with the aid of similarity transformation. The transformation enables to reduce the unsteady boundary layer equations to a system of non-linear ordinary differential equations. Numerical solution of resulting non-linear differential equations is found by using efficient shooting technique. Boundary layer thickness is explored numerically for some typical values of the unsteadiness parameter S and Prandtl number Pr, Eckert number Ec and Magnetic parameter Mn. Present analysis shows that the combined effect of magnetic field and viscous dissipation is to enhance the thermal boundary layer thickness.     

MHD mixed convection of a viscous dissipating fluid about a permeable vertical flat plate

The problem of steady laminar magnetohydrodynamic (MHD) mixed convection heat transfer about a vertical plate is studied numerically, taking into account the effects of Ohmic heating and viscous dissipation. A uniform magnetic field is applied perpendicular to the plate. The resulting governing equations are transformed into the non-similar boundary layer equations and solved using the Keller box method. Both the aiding-buoyancy mode and the opposing-buoyancy mode of the mixed convection are examined. The velocity and temperature profiles as well as the local skin friction and local heat transfer parameters are determined for different values of the governing parameters, mainly the magnetic parameter, the Richardson number, the Eckert number and the suction/injection parameter, f_w. For some specific values of the governing parameters, the results agree very well with those available in the literature. Generally, it is determined that the local skin friction coefficient and the local heat transfer coefficient increase owing to suction of fluid, increasing the Richardson number, Ri (i.e. the mixed convection parameter) or decreasing the Eckert number. This trend reverses for blowing of fluid and decreasing the Richardson number or decreasing the Eckert number. It is disclosed that the value of Ri determines the effect of the magnetic parameter on the momentum and heat transfer.     

Hydrodynamic and thermal slip flow boundary layers over a flat plate with constant heat flux boundary condition

In this paper the boundary layer flow over a flat plat with slip flow and constant heat flux surface condition is studied. Because the plate surface temperature varies along the x direction, the momentum and energy equations are coupled due to the presence of the temperature gradient along the plate surface. This coupling, which is due to the presence of the thermal jump term in Maxwell slip condition, renders the momentum and energy equations non-similar. As a preliminary study, this paper ignores this coupling due to thermal jump condition so that the self-similar nature of the equations is preserved. Even this fundamental problem for the case of a constant heat flux boundary condition has remained unexplored in the literature. It was therefore chosen for study in this paper. For the hydrodynamic boundary layer, velocity and shear stress distributions are presented for a range of values of the parameter characterizing the slip flow. This slip parameter is a function of the local Reynolds number, the local Knudsen number, and the tangential momentum accommodation coefficient representing the fraction of the molecules reflected diffusively at the surface. As the slip parameter increases, the slip velocity increases and the wall shear stress decreases. These results confirm the conclusions reached in other recent studies. The energy equation is solved to determine the temperature distribution in the thermal boundary layer for a range of values for both the slip parameter as well as the fluid Prandtl number. The increase in Prandtl number and/or the slip parameter reduces the dimensionless surface temperature. The actual surface temperature at any location of x is a function of the local Knudsen number, the local Reynolds number, the momentum accommodation coefficient, Prandtl number, other flow properties, and the applied heat flux.     

Effect of magnetic field dependent viscosity on ferroconvection in the presence of dust particles

This paper deals with the theoretical investigation of the effect of magnetic field dependent (MFD) viscosity on the thermal convection in a ferromagnetic fluid in the presence of dust particles. For a flat ferromagnetic fluid layer contained between two free boundaries, the exact solution is obtained using a linear stability analysis and a normal mode analysis method. For the case of stationary convection, dust particles always have a destabilizing effect, whereas the MFD viscosity has a stabilizing effect on the onset of convection. In the absence of MFD viscosity, the destabilizing effect of magnetization is depicted but in the presence of MFD viscosity, non-buoyancy magnetization may have a destabilizing or a stabilizing effect on the onset of convection. The critical wave number and critical magnetic thermal Rayleigh number for the onset of stationary convection are also determined numerically for sufficiently large values of buoyancy magnetization parameter M ₁. Graphs have been plotted by giving numerical values to the parameters to depict the stability characteristics. It is observed that the critical magnetic thermal Rayleigh number is reduced solely because the heat capacity of clean fluid is supplemented by that of the dust particles. The principle of exchange of stabilities is found to hold true for the ferromagnetic fluid heated from below in the absence of dust particles. The oscillatory modes are introduced due to the presence of the dust particles, which were non-existent in their absence. A sufficient condition for the non-existence of overstability is also obtained.     

Effect of variable density on hydromagnetic mixed convection flow of a non-Newtonian fluid past a moving vertical plate

The effect of temperature-dependent density on MHD mixed convection flow of power-law fluid past a moving semi-infinite vertical plate for high temperature differences between the plate and the ambient fluid is studied. The fluid density is assumed to decrease exponentially with temperature. The usual Boussinesq approximations are not considered due to the large temperature differences. The surface temperature of the moving plate was assumed to vary according to a power-law form, that is, T_w(x) = T_∞ + Ax^γ. The fluid is permeated by a uniform magnetic field imposed perpendicularly to the plate on the assumption of small magnetic Reynolds number. A numerical shooting algorithm for two unknown initial conditions with fourth-order Runge–Kutta integration scheme has been used to solve the coupled non-linear boundary value problem. The effects of various parameters on the velocity and temperature profiles as well as the local skin-friction coefficient and the local Nusselt number are presented graphically and in the tabular form. The results show that application of Boussinesq approximations in a non-Newtonian fluid subjected to high temperature differences gives a significant error in the values of the skin-friction coefficient and the application of an external magnetic field reduces this error markedly in the case of shear-thickening fluid.     

Magnetohydrodynamic non-Darcy mixed convection heat transfer from a vertical heated plate embedded in a porous medium with variable porosity

A numerical model is developed to study magnetohydrodynamics (MHD) mixed convection from a heated vertical plate embedded in a Newtonian fluid saturated sparsely packed porous medium by considering the variation of permeability, porosity and thermal conductivity. The boundary layer flow in the porous medium is governed by Forchheimer–Brinkman extended Darcy model. The conservation equations that govern the problem are reduced to a system of non-linear ordinary differential equations by using similarity transformations. Because of non-linearity, the governing equations are solved numerically. The effects of magnetic field on velocity and temperature distributions are studied in detail by considering uniform permeability (UP) and variable permeability (VP) of the porous medium and the results are discussed graphically. Besides, skin friction and Nusselt number are also computed for various physical parameters governing the problem under consideration. It is found that the inertial parameter has a significant influence in increasing the flow field and the rate of heat transfer for variable permeability case. The important finding of the present work is that the magnetic field has considerable effects on the boundary layer velocity and on the rate of heat transfer for variable permeability of the porous medium. Further, the results obtained under the limiting conditions were found to be in good agreement with the existing ones.     

Free convection flow about a cone under mixed thermal boundary conditions and a magnetic field

A similarity analysis was performed to investigate the laminar free-convection boundary-layer flow in the presence of a transverse magnetic field over a vertical down-pointing cone with mixed thermal boundary conditions. Boundary layer velocity and temperature profiles were determined numerically for various values of the magnetic parameter and the Prandtl number. The results show that the magnetic field suppresses the velocity profiles and increases the skin friction. The temperature profiles were expanded with increasing values of the magnetic parameter resulting in higher surface temperatures. A transformation relating the similarity solutions of the boundary-layer velocity and temperature profiles associated with different values of the mixed thermal boundary condition parameter was obtained.     

Similarity solutions for flow and heat transfer over a permeable surface with convective boundary condition

The steady laminar boundary layer flow over a permeable flat plate in a uniform free stream, with the bottom surface of the plate is heated by convection from a hot fluid is considered. Similarity solutions for the flow and thermal fields are possible if the mass transpiration rate at the surface and the convective heat transfer from the hot fluid on the lower surface of the plate vary like x^−1/2, where x is the distance from the leading edge of the solid surface. The governing partial differential equations are first transformed into ordinary differential equations, before being solved numerically. The effects of the governing parameters on the flow and thermal fields are thoroughly examined and discussed.     

Local-in-time well-posedness for compressible MHD boundary layer

In this paper, we are concerned with the motion of electrically conducting fluid governed by the two-dimensional non-isentropic viscous compressible MHD system on the half plane with no-slip condition on the velocity field, perfectly conducting wall condition on the magnetic field and Dirichlet boundary condition on the temperature on the boundary. When the viscosity, heat conductivity and magnetic diffusivity coefficients tend to zero in the same rate, there is a boundary layer which is described by a Prandtl-type system. Under the non-degeneracy condition on the tangential magnetic field instead of monotonicity of velocity, by applying a coordinate transformation in terms of the stream function of magnetic field as motivated by the recent work [27], we obtain the local-in-time well-posedness of the boundary layer system in weighted Sobolev spaces.     

Lie symmetry group analysis of magnetic field effects on free convective flow of a nanofluid over a semi-infinite stretching sheet

We investigate the steady two-dimensional flow of an incompressible water based nanofluid over a linearly semi-infinite stretching sheet in the presence of magnetic field numerically. The basic boundary layer equations for momentum and heat transfer are non-linear partial differential equations. Lie symmetry group transformations are used to convert the boundary layer equations into non-linear ordinary differential equations. The dimensionless governing equations for this investigation are solved numerically using Nachtsheim–Swigert shooting iteration technique together with fourth order Runge–Kutta integration scheme. Effects of the nanoparticle volume fraction ϕ, magnetic parameter M, Prandtl number Pr on the velocity and the temperature profiles are presented graphically and examined for different metallic and non-metallic nanoparticles. The skin friction coefficient and the local Nusselt number are also discussed for different nanoparticles.     

Unsteady hydromagnetic Couette flow of dusty fluid with temperature dependent viscosity and thermal conductivity under exponential decaying pressure gradient

In the present paper the unsteady Couette flow and heat transfer of a dusty conducting fluid between two parallel plates with temperature dependent viscosity and thermal conductivity are studied. The fluid is acted upon by an exponential decaying pressure gradient and an external uniform magnetic field is applied. The governing coupled momentum and energy equations are solved numerically using finite differences. The effect of the variable viscosity and thermal conductivity of the fluid and the uniform magnetic field on the velocity and temperature fields for both the fluid and dust particles is discussed.     

Effects of the magnetic field on direct contact melting transport processes during rotation

Contact melting heat transfer occurs via relative motion between the heating source and a phase change material (PCM) during melting in various applications. In this study, we investigated the physics of the close contact melting process generated by rotation and when subjected to an applied magnetic field. We transformed the physical model comprising the three-dimensional mass, momentum, and energy equations of the liquid melt layer in the cylindrical coordinate system, including the effects of the Lorentz forces and coupled with an interfacial energy jump condition, into a set of nonlinear similarity equations. Various characteristic dimensionless variables were identified, including an external force parameter σ, which defines the relationship between the external load on the PCM and the centrifugal force due to rotation, and a magnetic field parameter M. Numerical results were obtained and we systematically studied and interpreted the effects of various dimensionless variables on the contact melting and heat transfer processes during rotation, including the structures of the flow and thermal fields, melt layer thickness, and the melting and heat transfer rates. In particular, our results demonstrate that the melting and heat transfer rates increase while the liquid melt film becomes thinner as the external force parameter σ increases. By contrast, an increase in the magnetic field parameter M decreases the melting and heat transfer rates, while yielding relatively thicker melt layers.     

MHD-mixed convection from a vertical slender cylinder

The problem of steady laminar magnetohydrodynamic (MHD) mixed convection heat transfer about a vertical slender cylinder is studied numerically. A uniform magnetic field is applied perpendicular to the cylinder. The resulting governing equations are transformed into the non-similar boundary layer equations and solved using the Keller box method. The velocity and temperature profiles as well as the local skin friction and the local heat transfer parameters are determined for different values of the governing parameters, mainly the transverse curvature parameter, the magnetic parameter, the electric field parameter and the Richardson number. For some specific values of the governing parameters, the results agree very well with those available in the literature. Generally, it is determined that the local skin friction coefficient and the local heat transfer coefficient increase, increasing the Richardson number, Ri (i.e. the mixed convection parameter), electric field parameter E₁ and magnetic parameter Mn.     

Effect of dust particles on a layer of micropolar ferromagnetic fluid heated from below saturating a porous medium

The problem of the effect of dust particles on the thermal convection in micropolar ferromagnetic fluid saturating a porous medium subject to a transverse uniform magnetic field has been investigated theoretically. Linear stability analysis and normal mode analysis methods are used to find an exact solution for a flat micropolar ferromagnetic fluid layer contained between two free boundaries. In case of stationary convection, the effect of various parameters like medium permeability, dust particles, non-buoyancy magnetization, coupling parameter, spin-diffusion parameter and micropolar heat conduction parameter are analyzed. For sufficiently large values of magnetic parameter M₁, the critical magnetic thermal Rayleigh number for the onset of instability is determined numerically and results are depicted graphically. It is also observed that the critical magnetic thermal Rayleigh number is reduced solely because the heat capacity of clean fluid is supplemented by that of the dust particles. The principle of exchange of stabilities is found to hold true for the micropolar ferromagnetic fluid saturating a porous medium heated from below in the absence of micropolar viscous effect, microinertia and dust particles.     

Perturbation analysis of unsteady magnetohydrodynamic convective heat and mass transfer in a boundary layer slip flow past a vertical permeable plate with thermal radiation and chemical reaction

An analytical study for the problem of unsteady mixed convection with thermal radiation and first-order chemical reaction on magnetohydrodynamics boundary layer flow of viscous, electrically conducting fluid past a vertical permeable plate has been presented. Slip boundary condition is applied at the porous interface. The classical model is used for studying the effect of radiation for optically thin media. The non-linear coupled partial differential equations are solved by perturbation technique. The results obtained show that the velocity, temperature and concentration fields are appreciably influenced by the presence of chemical reaction, thermal stratification and magnetic field. It is observed that the effect of thermal radiation and magnetic field decreases the velocity, temperature and concentration profiles in the boundary layer. Also, the effects of the various parameters on the skin-friction coefficient and the rate of heat transfer at the surface are discussed.