A Parallel DSMC Investigation of Monatomic/Diatomic Gas Flows in a Micro/Nano Cavity

Abstract

In the current study, we performed a DSMC investigation to study the nonequilibrium effects on monatomic and diatomic rarefied flows in micro/nano lid-driven cavity. Our DSMC solver is parallel and benefits from a variable time step algorithm. The results of our simulation showed that growing rarefaction effects increase the maximum temperature of the cavity flow. As the inter-molecular rate of collision diminishes in the nonequilibrium regime, molecules manage to conserve their obtained energy from diffused surfaces; consequently, the flow temperature increases. We also investigate the nonequilibrium effects on the shear stress profile in the micro/nano cavity. Although increasing the Knudsen number decreases flow shear stress, the nondimensional shear stress, which shows the molecular potential for performing collision in the rarefied flow, increases.