Heat transfer characteristics of a Williamson fluid flow through a variable porosity regime

Abstract

A theoretical framework pertaining to the study of boundary layer flow of a Williamson fluid over a moving vertical cylinder with variable porosity has been discussed. The significance of this analysis is to investigate the heat transfer enhancement for a shear thinning flow over a cylinder entrenched in a variable permeability of the porous medium. Prandtl boundary layer equations with appropriate conditions are solved numerically through the utility of a Crank Nicholson method. The impressions of the various morphological and rheological characteristics involving parameters like variable porosity parameter, Williamson parameter, Nusselt number and Sherwood number have been scrutinized and presented graphically. Low-velocity profile develops for the variable porosity parameter with high intensity. It has been discerned that the ferocity of heat and mass transfer rates is high, when there is less variation supervenes in the shear-thinning fluids. Moreover, the velocity boundary layer will override the thermal boundary layer for a substantial increase in the Prandtl number. Further, the validation of the results was verified through an extensive comparative study with the available results in the literature.

KEYWORDS:

• Williamson fluid
• variable permeability of the porous medium
• variable inertial coefficient
• heat and mass transfer
• free convection
• finite difference scheme

Acknowledgements

The authors acknowledge the constructive suggestions received from the Reviewers and the Editor which led to definite improvement in the paper. Also, the author’s thanks are due to Professor M. Taylor, University of Central Florida, Orlando, Florida 32816, USA for editing the manuscript for better readability and English.

Disclosure statement

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