Entropy production in unsteady MHD double diffusive and chemically reactive nanofluid flow past a rotating permeable plate using overlapping grid spectral collocation technique

Abstract

The entropy production phenomenon due to the applied external magnetic fields, thermal dissipation, chemical reaction and the impact of rotating pervious plate on heat transfer, nanofluid friction and mass transfer has been numerically explored. The nanofluid flow is presumed to be unsteady, smooth, hydro-dynamically and electrically conducting. The well known Navier–Stokes time-dependent equations in cartesian coordinates for velocity, temperature and concentration are modelled and scaled down to a system of ODEs by applying suitable similarity transformations with unsteady dimensionless parameters. A new numerical scheme known as the overlapping grids spectral collocation method (OGSCM) is applied in finding the approximate solutions to the highly nonlinear ODEs. The results obtained are then used for solving the entropy equation and the rate of irreversibility is represented graphically. Several engineering variables, such as the coefficient of heat transfer, Nusselt number and Sherwood number, are also thoroughly examined. The OGSCM proved to be accurate, computationally efficient, time efficient and converges fast. We discovered that increased applied magnetic field, chemical reaction parameter, rotation parameter, and Schmidt parameter insert more energy into the system which reduces the thermal boundary layer and hence reducing the rate of entropy generation. Furthermore, the entropy generation rate is increased by increasing the Grashof number, Brinkman number, permeability, Prandtl number, and thermal radiation parameter.

Keywords:

• Entropy production
• double diffusive
• chemically reactive
• overlapping grids spectral collocation method

Acknowledgments

The authors are grateful to the University of KwaZulu-Natal, South Africa and North- Eastern Hill University, Shillong, India for the support given.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).