The effect of temperature and external force on the thermal behavior of oil-based refrigerant inside a nanochannel using molecular dynamics simulation

Abstract

Heat transfer (HT) has always been one of the major challenges in engineering. Many approaches have been offered to enhance or control HT. One of the common techniques to develop the thermal performance of devices is to use nano-sized channels. This study is aimed to examine the influence of temperature and external force (EF) on nanochannel simulated samples by molecular dynamics simulation (MDS). The present study examined the effect of initial temperature (300–400 K) and EF (with 0.001–0.01 eV/Å) on oil inside the nanochannel. The results show that increasing temperatures up to 350 K increases the heat flux (HF) and thermal conductivity (TC) increase and decreases due to the increased number and intensity of atomic collisions in the structures. The HF and TC at 350 K are 946 W/m2 and 0.66 W/m.K. Also, by changing the EF from 0.001 to 0.01 eV/Å, the HF increases from 911 to 942 W/m2 and the TC by 0.52 to 0.63 W/m.K. So, with anincrement in EF, oscillation amplitude increases, and thermal performance improves. Since the thermal performance of refrigerant is noticeable in various industrial applications, it’s hopeful this study proposed an optimal mechanism in practical samples.