Eur. Phys. J. Plus (2017) 132: 237
https://doi.org/10.1140/epjp/i2017-11504-y

Regular Article

Influence of viscous dissipation on a copper oxide nanofluid in an oblique channel: Implementation of the KKL model

¹ Department of Mathematics, Faculty of Sciences, HITEC University Taxila Cantt, Taxila, Pakistan
² Department of Mathematics, Mohi-ud-Din Islamic University, Narian Shareef, Azad Jammu and Kashmir, Pakistan
³ Department of Mathematics, COMSATS Institute of Information Technology, Abbottabad, Pakistan
⁴ Department of Mathematics, SBK Women University, Quetta, Pakistan

^* e-mail: umarkhan@ciit.net.pk

Received: 27 March 2017
Accepted: 19 April 2017
Published online: 26 May 2017

Abstract

This paper aims to study the flow of a nanofluid in the presence of viscous dissipation in an oblique channel (nonparallel plane walls). For thermal conductivity of the nanofluid, the KKL model is utilized. Water is taken as the base fluid and it is assumed to be containing the solid nanoparticles of copper oxide. The appropriate set of partial differential equations is transformed into a self-similar system with the help of feasible similarity transformations. The solution of the model is obtained analytically and to ensure the validity of analytical solutions, numerically one is also calculated. The homotopy analysis method (HAM) and the Runge-Kutta numerical method (coupled with shooting techniques) have been employed for the said purpose. The influence of the different flow parameters in the model on velocity, thermal field, skin friction coefficient and local rate of heat transfer has been discussed with the help of graphs. Furthermore, graphical comparison between the local rate of heat transfer in regular fluids and nanofluids has been made which shows that in case of nanofluids, heat transfer is rapid as compared to regular fluids.