Thermal-conductivity and thermal-diffusivity measurements of nanofluids by 3ω method and mechanism analysis of heat transport

A 3 omega technique is developed for simultaneous determination of the thermal conductivity and thermal diffusivity of nanofluids. The 3 omega measuring system is established, in which a conductive wire is used as both heater and sensor. At first, the system is calibrated using water with known thermophysical properties. Then, the thermal conductivity and thermal diffusivity of TiO2/distilled water nanofluids at different temperatures and volume fractions and the thermal conductivity of SiO2 nanofluids with different carrier fluids (water, ethanol, and EG) are determined. The results show that the working temperature and the carrier fluid play important roles in the enhancement of thermal transport in nanofluids. These results agree with the predictions for the temperature dependence effect by the Brownian motion model and the micro-convection model. For SiO2 nanofluids, the thermal-conductance enhancement becomes strong with a decrease in the heat capacity of the carrier fluids. Finally, according to our results and mechanism analysis, a corrected term is introduced to the Brownian motion model for providing better prediction of heat transport performance in nanofluids.