Numerical study of micropolar nanofluid flow between two parallel permeable disks with thermophysical property and Arrhenius activation energy

Abstract

A steady-state, incompressible, laminar, and axi-symmetric flow of micropolar nanofluid flowing between two porous disks is investigated. The impacts of variable thermal conductivity and Arrhenius activation energy are incorporated in non-Newtonian fluid model. The electrically conducting fluid experiences the influence of externally applied transverse magnetic field. The parallel porous disks are subjected to a constant uniform injection. A dimensionless form of non-linear flow equations is achieved by the implementation of similarity transformations. The obtained system is then solved by applying Runge-Kutta-Fehlberg (RKF-45) method. The physical parameters on flow, thermal, and concentration fields are described graphically. The three dimensional flow visualization is also presented. The numerical values of shear stresses, couple stresses, heat transportation rate, and mass transportation rate at the upper and lower disks are calculated against the physical quantities in tabular format. It is observed that micropolar fluids are beneficial in the enhancement of couple stresses and in the reduction of shear stresses, which can be helpful for the flow control in polymeric processes. The thermophoretic and Brownian motion parameters have opposite effects on concentration profiles. The concentration field is enhanced by the activation energy parameter.