A spatial-fractional thermal transport model for nanofluid in porous media

In this paper, a spatial fractional-order thermal transport equation with the Caputo derivative is proposed to describe convective heat transfer of nanofluids within disordered porous media in boundary layer flow. This equation arises naturally when the effect of anomalous migration of nanoparticles on heat transfer is considered. The numerical results show that local Nusselt numbers of four different kinds of nanofluids are all inversely proportional to the fractional derivative exponent β. Based on this finding, it is concluded that the anomalous diffusion of nanoparticles improves the convective heat transfer of nanofluids and the space fractional thermal transport equation may serve as a candidate model for studying nanofluids. Additionally, the effects of other involved physical parameters on temperature distribution and Nusselt number are presented and analyzed.