Eur. Phys. J. Plus (2014) 129: 182
https://doi.org/10.1140/epjp/i2014-14182-3

Regular Article

Thermo-diffusion effects on MHD oblique stagnation-point flow of a viscoelastic fluid over a convective surface

¹ Department of Mathematics, Quaid-i-Azam University, 45320, 44000, Islamabad, Pakistan
² DBS&H, CEME, National University of Sciences and Technology, Islamabad, Pakistan

^* e-mail: rmqau@hotmail.com

Received: 12 April 2014
Revised: 5 June 2014
Accepted: 14 July 2014
Published online: 27 August 2014

Abstract

The main objective of the present study is to analyse the thermo-diffusion effects on a steady, 2-D magnetohydrodynamic (MHD) stagnation-point flow of an obliquely striking viscoelastic (second grade) fluid over a stretching convective surface. The governing system of equations is extremely complicated and non-linear in nature. These equations are solved numerically using midpoint integration scheme with Richardson’s extrapolation. The results for normal and tangential components of velocity, temperature and concentration profiles are displayed and analysed. Numerical computations are performed to discover the influence of relevant physical parameters of physical quantities of interest such as local skin friction coefficient, local heat and mass flux and are presented in tabulated form. It is found that the magnetic field disturbs the obliqueness of the flow, decreases the normal skin friction coefficient, whereas it enhances the tangential skin friction coefficient. Influence of Soret and Dufour numbers on the temperature and concentration profile are found to be quite opposite. A suitable agreement with the existing literature is shown to support the current study for the limiting case.