Features of activation energy for a flow with microrotation near stagnation region and unbounded domain : a spectral simulation

Abstract

This article is motivated to find the impact of various flow controlling parameters such as viscous dissipation, negative and positive values of activation energy on MHD stagnation point micropolar nanofluid flow over a surface. However, negative activation energy is scarce in practice, but the impact of negative values of activation energy could not be neglected as seen in chemical processes. The present mathematical model is solved with successive linearization method (a spectral technique). The velocity, angular velocity, temperature and concentration profiles are drawn by varying flow controlling parameters. The bar diagrams for skin friction, Nusselt number, Sherwood number and couple stress are also displayed. Results indicate that the activation energy boosts the concentration profile up. The negative values of activation energy have higher impact on concentration curves compared to positive values. Arrhenius function decays as activation energy enlarges. This eventually promotes the generative chemical reaction due to which concentration rises. By varying thermophoretic parameter from 0.1 to 0.3, 88.65% and 8.34% enhancement is captured in heat transfer and mass transfer respectively.

Keywords:

• Micropolar nanofluid
• activation energy
• stagnation point flow

Disclosure statement

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

Additional information

Funding

This work is supported by the DST-FIST (Fund for Improvement of S&T Infrastructure in Universities and Higher Educational Institutions) for the grant SR/FIST/MS-1/2017/13.