Masters Thesis

Numerical simulation and parametric study of bubble growth during water and nanofluid flow boiling in a microchannel

In recent years, heat dissipation in micro-electronic devices has become a significant limitation for electronics manufacturers. The amount of heat generation per unit area increases as electronic devices become smaller. Micro heat exchangers have become one of the most effective cooling solutions due to their ability to remove a significant amount of heat from small electronic devices. Utilization of two phase flow in these heat exchangers provides an advantage of removing more heat than single phase flow. Microchannel is the most important part of the micro heat exchangers but it is also the most challenging part due to complications of boiling phenomenon in microchannels. Investigating the bubble dynamics inside these channels helps to better understand the bubble behavior to improve current designs of micro heat exchangers. In this study, a numerical model has been used to perform a parametric study of the bubble dynamics inside a microchannel. Effect of Reynolds number, wall superheat, and bubble contact angles has been studied. Effect of using nanofluids as a homogenous mixture to improve heat transfer has been studied, too. The results show a significant change in bubble dynamics by changing the wall superheat and bubble contact angles. On the other hand, changing the Reynolds number and nanofluid concentration were found to be less effective in altering the bubble dynamics.

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