A Study on the Effects of Inclined Magnetic Field, Flow Medium Porosity and Thermal Radiation on Free Convection of Casson Nanofluid over a Vertical Plate

In this paper, variational homotopy perturbation method with Padé approximant technique is applied to investigate the impacts of inclined magnetic field, flow medium porosity and thermal radiation on free convection flow and heat transfer of Casson nanofluids over a vertical plate. The accuracies of the developed analytical methods are verified by comparing the results of the analytical solutions with the results of past works as presented in literature. Thereafter, the analytical solutions are used to investigate the effects of thermal radiation; Prandtl number, nanoparticles volume-fraction, shape and type on the flow and heat transfer behaviour of various nanofluids over the flat plate. It is observed that both the velocity and temperature of the nanofluid as well viscous and thermal boundary layers increase with increase in the radiation parameter. The velocity and temperature of the nanofluid decreases and increases, respectively as the Prandtl number and volume-fraction of the nanoparticles in the basefluid increase. The maximum decrease in velocity and maximum increase in temperature are caused lamina shaped nanoparticle and followed by platelets, cylinder, bricks and sphere-shaped nanoparticles, respectively. It is hoped that the present study will enhance the understanding of free convection boundary-layer problems under the influence of thermal radiation as applied in various engineering processes.