Effects of buoyancy and thermal radiation on MHD flow over a stretching porous sheet using homotopy analysis method

This paper investigates the theoretical influence of buoyancy and thermal radiation on MHD flow over a stretching porous sheet. The model which constituted highly nonlinear governing equations is transformed using similarity solution and then solved using homotopy analysis method (HAM). The analysis is carried out up to the 5th order of approximation and the influences of different physical parameters such as Prandtl number, Grashof number, suction/injection parameter, thermal radiation parameter and heat generation/absorption coefficient and also Hartman number on dimensionless velocity, temperature and the rate of heat transfer are investigated and discussed quantitatively with the aid of graphs. Numerical results obtained are compared with the previous results published in the literature and are found to be in good agreement. It was found that when the buoyancy parameter and the fluid velocity increase, the thermal boundary layer decreases. In case of the thermal radiation, increasing the thermal radiation parameter produces significant increases in the thermal conditions of the fluid temperature which cause more fluid in the boundary layer due to buoyancy effect, causing the velocity in the fluid to increase. The hydrodynamic boundary layer and thermal boundary layer thickness increase as a result of increase in radiation. (C) 2015 Faculty of Engineering, Alexandria University. Production and hosting by Elsevier B.V. This is an open access article under the CC BY-NC-ND license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/).