Effects of Temperature-Dependent Viscosity on Natural Convection in Porous Media

This analysis has studied natural convection for the temperature-dependent viscosity of fluids inside porous media between two concentric spheres by numerically solving the Brinkman-Darcy-Forchheimer model, vorticity transport, and energy equations. Parameters included Rayleigh numbers (5.0x10(3)-8.0x10(4)) at radius ratios of 1.5, 2.0, and 3.5 with porosities of 0.4 and 0.9 for variable-viscosity fluids with Prandtl numbers (158, 405, and 720) when the Darcy number was changed at 0.1 and 0.001. The results showed that the mean Nusselt number varied with Rayleigh number, porosity, radius ratio, and variable viscosity but did not change with the Darcy number.