Three-dimensional natural convection of molten Lithium in a differentially heated rotating cubic cavity about a vertical ridge

• Thermal buoyancy, centrifugal and Coriolis forces affect the rotating molten Lithium flow.
• Coriolis forces suppress thermal buoyancy effects.
• Increasing centrifugal forces involve the buoyancy forces.
• Heat transfer rate decreases significantly with Taylor number for weak rotational number.

Laminar natural convection heat transfer in three-dimensional molten Lithium filled differentially heated enclosure, rotating about the vertical ridge is studied numerically. Computations are performed for a wide range of dimensionless parameters including the rotational Rayleigh number, and Taylor number while the values of Rayleigh number and Prandtl numbers are maintained constant at Ra = 2 × 104 and Pr = 0.0321, respectively. The results indicate that Coriolis forces seem to have a dominant role to suppress the thermal buoyancy driven effects. Transverse velocity isovaleurs show three-dimensional characteristics of the flow. By increasing, the Taylor number, the maxima of heat transfer gradually reduced about 55%. In the contrast, high rotational Rayleigh number values are found to significantly alter the flow patterns by increasing mixing which turn enhances the heat transfer.

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