On the diffusion reaction of fourth-grade hydromagnetic fluid flow and thermal criticality in a plane Couette medium

Abstract

This study investigates hydromagnetic fourth-grade reactive diffusion, exothermic temperature distribution of the fluid flow and ignition criticality in a channel. This is important to improve the optimal efficiency of engineering devices and industrial machines. The fully exothermic combustible reaction occurs in a Couette medium with molecular diffusion. Ignoring material reacting consumption, the heat exchange in the system is greater than the ambient heat exchange, and the viscoelastic liquid is propelled by pre-exponential reaction rate and upper wall motion of the device. The resulted highly nonlinear dimensionless time variation, boundary value equations are solved by finite semi-discretization difference method. The obtained solutions for various parameters dependent flow characteristic are plotted and discussed. It is seen that activation energy increases the system thermal criticality while chemical kinetics decreases thermal ignition. Also, it is noticed from the study that the terms that raises the heat generation must be managed in order to prevent solution explosion and enhances optimal performance of engineering devices. The results from this study will assist in understanding the safe and unsafe regime of a system which can help in the chemical synthesis industries and thermal engineering operations.