Aggregation study of Brownian nanoparticles in convective phenomena

Abstract

The explanation of abnormal enhancement of transported energy in colloidal nanoparticles in a liquid has sparked much interest in recent years. The complexity comes from the inter-particle phenomenon and cluster formation. The process of nanoparticle aggregation, which is caused by convective phenomena and particle-to-particle interaction energy in a flow, is investigated in this research. Therefore, the probability of collision and cohesion among clusters is modelled, as stated in this research. ANSYS-Fluent 17 CFD tools are employed to implement a new method of nanoparticle aggregation, new essential forces, new heat law and cluster drag coefficient. The importance of the interaction forces is compared to drag force, and essential forces are considered in coupling between nanoparticles and fluid flow. An important parameter is defined for the surface energy density regarding the attractive energy between the double layer and surrounding fluid to capture the cohesion of particles. Particles’ random migration is also presented through their angular and radial displacement. The analyses for interactions show the significance of Brownian motion in both particles’ migration and coupling effects in the fluid. However, nanoparticles are pushed away from walls due to repulsive forces, and Brownian motion is found to be effective mainly on angular displacement around the tube centreline. The attractive energy is found to be dominant when two clusters are at an equal distance. Hence, the cluster formation in convective regions should be taken into account for modelling purposes. A higher concentrated region also occurs midway between the centreline and the heated wall.