Heat and mass transfer enhancement for falling film absorption process by SiO2 binary nanofluids

The objectives of this study are to visualize the dispersion of nano-particles in binary nanofluids, to find the effect of key parameters such as SiO2 nano-particles concentration on the distribution stability in the H2O/LiBr nanofluids, and to measure the vapor absorption rate and heat transfer rate for falling film flow of binary nanofluids. The binary nanofluids are H2O/LiBr with SiO2 nano-particle. The key parameters are the base fluid concentration of LiBr, the concentration of SiO2 nano-particles in vol%, and kinds of additives. It is found that the concentration of SiO2 nano-particles should be less than 0.01 regardless of the existence of the distribution stabilizer. It is also found that the maximum improvements of heat transfer rate and mass transfer rate reach 46.8% and 18%, respectively, when the concentration of SiO2 nano-particle is 0.005 vol%. (C) 2011 Elsevier Ltd and IIR. All rights reserved.