A Novel Numerical Method for Simulating Boiling Heat Transfer of Nanofluids

In this paper, a new approach called the Eulerian species method was proposed for simulating the convective and/or boiling heat transfer of nanofluids. The movement of nanoparticles in nanofluids is tracked by the species transport equation, and the boiling process of nanofluids is computed by the Eulerian multiphase method coupled with the RPI boiling model. The validity of the species transport equation for simulating nanoparticles movement was verified by conducting a simulation of nanofluids convective heat transfer. Simulation results of boiling heat transfer of nanofluids were obtained by using the commercial CFD software ANSYS Fluent and compared with experimental data and results from another numerical method (Eulerian three-phase model). Good agreement with experimental data was achieved, and it was proved the Eulerian species method is better than the Eulerian three-phase model since it can give better simulation results with higher accuracy but needs fewer computation resources.