Analytical and Numerical Study of Double Diffusion Natural Convection in a Shallow Enclosure with Nanofluids: Impact of the Lewis Number on Heat and Mass Transfers

Abstract

Throughout this study, the Lewis number influence on double-diffusive natural convection inside a rectangular cavity horizontally disposed, filled with Copper nanoparticles dispersed in water, heated and salted by constant thermal and solutal fluxes on the side walls while the horizontal ones are assumed thermally adiabatic and solutally impermeable, is studied analytically (parallel flow approximation) and numerically (finite difference method) for a large range of the aspect ratio, 1 ≤ A ≤ 16, the Lewis number, 10-3 ≤ Le ≤ 103, and the nanoparticles volume fractions, φ = 0 and 0.05. The results revealed that the numerical and analytical outcomes showed a good agreement. Both the aspect ratio and the Lewis number have a range responsible for variations in heat and mass transfer rates, A ≤ 12 and 10-2 ≤ Le ≤ 10 for Nusselt number and Le ≥ 10-2 for Sherwood number. The results obtained by examining the interest of using nanofluids in the considered configuration were against all expectations, that they led to a degradation of the rates of heat and mass transfers with the increase in the nanoparticle volume fraction.