Thermal and hydrodynamic characteristics of water-based suspensions of Al2O3 nanoparticles in a novel minichannel heat sink

In this study, the effect of using nanofluids on heat transfer and fluid flow characteristics in triangular shaped minichannel heat sink is numerically investigated. The minichannel heat sink performance using alumina-water (Al2O3-H2O) nanofluid as a coolant with different volume fractions is examined. The three-dimensional steady, laminar flow and heat transfer governing equations are solved using finite volume method (FVM). The heat sink performance is evaluated in terms of Nusselt number, friction factor, thermal resistance and pumping power. The results indicate that, using of nanofluid instead of pure fluid as a coolant leads to enhanced heat transfer performance by increasing the amount of heat dissipated. Also, the results reveal that when the volume fraction of nanoparticles is increased under the extreme heat flux, both the heat transfer coefficient and friction factor are increased while the thermal resistance of the heat sink is decreased. Furthermore, only a slight increase in the pressure drop across the minichannel heat sink is found compared with the pure water-cooled heat sink.