Thermal investigation of Cu–water nanofluid between two vertical planes

Abstract

In this paper, the natural convection of a non-Newtonian Cu–water nanofluid between two infinite parallel vertical flat plates is investigated. The basic partial differential equations are reduced to ordinary differential equations which are solved analytically using homotopy perturbation method. The comparison between the results from homotopy perturbation and numerical methods are in good agreement which proves the capability of this method for solving this problem. The effects of the nanoparticle volume fraction, dimensionless non-Newtonian viscosity and Eckert number on flow and heat transfer characteristics are examined. The results show that as nanoparticle volume fraction increases, the momentum boundary layer thickness increases with the decrease in the thermal boundary layer thickness.