Generalized exact solutions for boundary layer flow and heat transfer over permeable stretching sheets

The flow of a viscoelastic fluid over a porous stretching sheet is considered in the presence of a transverse magnetic field, volumetric heating, heat transfer, and a range of other effects. By observing the essential mathematical mechanism by which exact solutions have been generated in many previous studies, it is shown how a framework may be developed that both unifies and generalizes previously-reported closed-form solutions to such problems. It is further shown how, by judicious choices of the arbitrary functions involved, novel exact solutions that do not seem to have appeared previously may be generated.