Nanofluid multi-phase convective heat transfer in closed domain: Simulation with lattice Boltzmann method

The lattice Boltzmann method is applied to simulate the thermal field and flow field of nanofluid natural convection in a square cavity. The heat transfer characteristics of nanofluid are compared with that of water to explore nanofluid heat transfer mechanism. The flow field shows different characters at different Rayleigh number and the average Nusselt number is obtained changing with Rayleigh number. (C) 2011 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.