Thermo-fluidic transport process in a double-driven cavity with triangular adiabatic obstacles

Abstract

The present study aims to explore the mixed convective magnetohydrodynamic transport phenomena of nanofluid flow in a differentially heated double-driven-cavity with adiabatic equilateral triangular obstacles inside. The top and bottom walls of the upper and lower cavity are insulated and translating into opposite directions. COMSOL Multiphysics software has been used for conducting the numerical study. The cases of different obstacles size are analyzed. A CuO-water-based nanofluid is filled inside the complex double-driven cavity. A numerical approach is adopted to solve the coupled governing equations using the finite Galerkin method. The convective phenomena and associated heat transfer characteristics are examined systematically for a range of control parameters like Rayleigh numbers (103–105), Hartmann number (0–100), and nano-fluid volume fraction (0–0.05), and the size of the equilateral triangular adiabatic block (0, 0.2 and 0.4). The illustrations of the local distribution of streamlines, isotherms are presented along with the average Nusselt number, Nu. This study shows that the presence of adiabatic blocks not only controls the flow characteristics but also improves the heat transfer rates. Both the characteristics are further strongly influenced by the involved flow controlling parameters and their ranges. The study also illustrates the importance of the size of the adiabatic blocks on heat transfer.