Natural convection flow of Sodium Alginate based Casson nanofluid about a solid sphere in the presence of a magnetic field with constant surface heat flux

Abstract

Abstract In this paper, we examined a free convection flow of Sodium Alginate (SA) as a host Casson fluid with three different types of nanoparticles specifically, Silicon Dioxide (SiO2), Copper oxide (CuO), and Copper (Cu) on a solid sphere in the presence of magnetic field along with prescribed surface heat flux. The Keller-box method was carried out for solving the transformed governing partial differential equations. Numerical results for the local skin friction coefficient are obtained and compared with literature. Also, the influences of Casson parameter, magnetic parameter, nanoparticles volume fraction, on local skin friction coefficient, local Nusselt number, temperature, and velocity are analyzed graphically. Our study revealed that the local Nusselt number, local skin friction coefficient and velocity profiles of SiO2 - SA based Casson nanofluid are higher than the other nanoparticles - SA based Casson nanofluid, as well as it has the lowest temperature profiles.