Reduced thermal conductivity of a nanoparticle decorated nanowire: A non-equilibrium molecular dynamics study

Abstract

The effect of nanoparticles decoration on the thermal conductivity of a nanowire is studied using Non Equilibrium Molecular Dynamics (NEMD) simulation. The simulation was conducted using simplified molecular model with Lennard-Jones potential. Argon-like solid was used as the material for both the nanowire and nanoparticles. Nanoparticles were placed on the surface of the nanowire and also embedded inside the structure. Non-equilibrium molecular dynamics simulation was conducted by imposing temperature gradient along the length of the nanowire and thermal conductivity of the nanowire was calculated. Nanowire without any nanoparticles was used as the baseline data. Due to presence of nanoparticles thermal conductivity of the nanowire was observed to decrease and up to 40% reduction in thermal conductivity was observed. With the increase in number of the nanoparticles, thermal conductivity was observed to decrease; however size of nanoparticles has little effect.