Pramana

, Volume 65, Issue 5, pp 863–869 | Cite as

A micro-convection model for thermal conductivity of nanofluids

  • Hrishikesh E. Patel
  • T. Sundararajan
  • T. Pradeep
  • A. Dasgupta
  • N. Dasgupta
  • Sarit K. Das
Article

Abstract

Increase in the specific surface area as well as Brownian motion are supposed to be the most significant reasons for the anomalous enhancement in thermal conductivity of nanofluids. This work presents a semi-empirical approach for the same by emphasizing the above two effects through micro-convection. A new way of modeling thermal conductivity of nanofluids has been explored which is found to agree excellently with a wide range of experimental data obtained by the present authors as well as the data published in literature

Keywords

Micro-convection nanofluid thermal conductivity Brownian motion 

PACS Nos

44.10.+I 44.35.+c 47.55.Kf 
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Copyright information

© Indian Academy of Sciences 2005

Authors and Affiliations

  • Hrishikesh E. Patel
    • 1
  • T. Sundararajan
    • 1
  • T. Pradeep
    • 2
  • A. Dasgupta
    • 3
  • N. Dasgupta
    • 3
  • Sarit K. Das
    • 1
  1. 1.Department of Mechanical EngineeringIndian Institute of Technology MadrasChennaiIndia
  2. 2.Department of Chemistry and Sophisticated Analytical Instrument FacilityIndian Institute of Technology MadrasChennaiIndia
  3. 3.Department of Electrical EngineeringIndian Institute of Technology MadrasChennaiIndia

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