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A new model for heat conduction of nanofluids based on fractal distributions of nanoparticles

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2006 J. Phys. D: Appl. Phys. 39 4486

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IOP PUBLISHING JOURNAL OF PHYSICS D: APPLIED PHYSICS
J. Phys. D: Appl. Phys. 41 (2008) 139801 (1pp) doi:10.1088/0022-3727/41/13/139801

Corrigendum
A new model for heat conduction of nanofluids
based on fractal distributions of nanoparticles
Jie Xu and Boming Yu 2006 J. Phys. D: Appl. Phys. 39
44864490

On page 4488 in the ninth line from the bottom of the right
column, the text and df = 1.7 1010 m for water should be
corrected to read as and df = 4.5 1010 m for water.

0022-3727/08/139801+01$30.00 1 2008 IOP Publishing Ltd Printed in the UK

INSTITUTE OF PHYSICS PUBLISHING JOURNAL OF PHYSICS D: APPLIED PHYSICS
J. Phys. D: Appl. Phys. 39 (2006) 44864490 doi:10.1088/0022-3727/39/20/028

A new model for heat conduction of

nanofluids based on fractal distributions
of nanoparticles
Jie Xu, Boming Yu1 , Mingqing Zou and Peng Xu
Department of Physics, Huazhong University of Science and Technology, 1037 Luoyu Road,
Wuhan, 430074, Peoples Republic of China
E-mail: yuboming2003@yahoo.com.cn

Received 21 June 2006, in final form 2 August 2006

Published 29 September 2006
Online at stacks.iop.org/JPhysD/39/4486

Abstract
In this paper we report a new model for predicting the thermal conductivity
of nanofluids by taking into account the fractal distribution of nanoparticle
sizes and heat convection between nanoparticles and liquids due to the
Brownian motion of nanoparticles in fluids. The proposed model is
expressed as a function of the average size of nanoparticles, fractal
dimension, concentration of nanoparticles, temperature and properties of
fluids. The model shows the reasonable dependences of the thermal
conductivity on the temperature of nanofluids, nanoparticle size and
concentration. The parameter c introduced in thermal boundary layer
depends on fluids, but is independent of nanoparticles added in the fluids.
The model predictions are in good agreement with the available experimental
data. The model also reveals that there is a critical concentration of 12.6%
of nanoparticles at which the contribution from heat convection due to the
Brownian movement of nanoparticles reaches the maximum value, below
which the contribution from heat convection decreases with the decrease in
concentration and above which the contribution from heat convection
decreases with the increase in concentration.

1. Introduction the traditional models for composites, such as the Hamilton

Fluids with suspended nanoparticles are called nanofluids. The
term, nanofluid, was named by Choi in 1995 [1]. Nanofluids
are thought to be the next-generation heat transfer fluids
because the thermal conductivity can be significantly increased
by adding small amount of nanoparticles. Many researchers
have carried out their experiments [27] to verify the results
by Choi. Recently Jow et al [8] designed a measurement
device for thermal conductivity of nanofluids. The thermal
conductivity of nanofluids attracts more and more interest
both experimentally and theoretically. However, no generally
accepted theory for explaining this anomalous increase is
available.
Since the pioneering work by Maxwell [9], several
researchers [1013] developed theories for the effective
thermal conductivity (k) of multiphase systems. However,
1 Author to whom any correspondence should be addressed.
Crosser model (HC), completely fail to explain the
enhancement in the effective thermal conductivity of
nanofluids. Some researchers reported that the possible
mechanisms for enhancing thermal conductivity are mainly
related to the interaction between nanoparticles and liquids,
the size of nanoparticles, nanoparticle clustering and the heat
convection due to Brownian motion of nanoparticles in the
liquids. Different authors proposed different renovated models
based on the former works to explain the mechanisms of heat
transfer in nanofluids [1422]. Kumar et al [21] considered
the heat convection due to Brownian motion of particles in
the fluids and assumed that the effective thermal conductivity
of the particle is directly proportional to its mean velocity and
expressed the thermal conductivity of the particle as kp = c u p ,
where u p is the average particle velocity and c is a constant.
However, this model results in an unreasonable result because
when the mean velocity u p of nanoparticles is zero, the thermal
conductivity of the particle is kp = 0 according to the equation.

0022-3727/06/204486+05$30.00 2006 IOP Publishing Ltd Printed in the UK 4486


This is inconsistent with the practical situation [23] because
when u p = 0, even though all the particles are stationary, the
thermal conductivity of the particle should be equal to that of
the particle itself and should be non-zero. Jang et al [22]
proposed a model for the effective thermal conductivity of
nanofluids, but the model introduced an empirical constant
which has no physical meaning. Ren et al [20] built a model
which includes the effects of nanolayer and heat convection of
nanoparticles in the fluids. While most models are based on
an assumption that suspended nanoparticles in nanofluids have
uniform diameters, recent experimental study [16] showed
the nanoparticles might differ in size and follows the fractal
distribution. To date there is no model that takes into account
the size distribution of nanoparticles.
In this work, we derive a model for heat convection due to
the Brownian motion of nanoparticles by applying the fractal
geometry theory and explain the mechanisms of the enhanced
heat transfer in nanofluids.
2. Description of the thermal conductivity model
We divide the heat transfer in nanofluids into two portions:
the heat transferred by stationary nanoparticles and the other
by heat convection caused by moving nanoparticles. The total
thermal conductivity of nanofluids is thus expressed as
knf = ks + kc , (1)
where ks is the thermal conductivity by stationary nanoparticles
in the liquid, which is simulated by the HC model and
kc is the thermal conductivity by heat convection caused
by Brownian motion of nanoparticles. The HC model for
spherical nanoparticles suspended in nanofluids is expressed
as [10]
ks kp + 2kf 2(kf kp )
= , (2)
kf kp + 2kf + (kf kp )
where kp and kf are the thermal conductivities of particles and
fluid, respectively, and is the concentration of nanoparticles
in nanofluids. Here we focus our attention on the second
term kc in equation (1). According to the theory by Tomotika
et al [24], the Nusselt number for liquid flowing around a
sphere can be expressed as Nu = 2.0+0.5ReP r +O(Re2 P r 2 ),
where P r(=/ = /f = cp /kf ) is the Prandtl number that the ratio of min /max = 103 best fits the experimental
for fluids and , , , f and cp are kinematical viscosity, data for different porous media. We consider that the pores
thermal diffusion coefficient, absolute viscosity, density and
specific heat of fluid at constant pressure, respectively. Re(=
up /) is the Reynolds number, where is the diameter of
nanoparticles and up is the velocity of particle, and up =
D0 / lf [22], where lf is the mean free path of liquid molecule,
and we assume that lf is the same as the diameter of liquid
molecule. D0 is the nanoparticle diffusion coefficient, which
is determined by D0 = kb T /3, where T is temperature
and kb = 1.38 1023 J K1 is the Boltzmann constant.
The viscosity is given by = A 10B/(T C) [25], where
A = 2.414 105 , B = 247.8 and C = 140 for water. At
room temperature, say T = 300 K, we can calculate the value
of (=2.414 103.45 Pa s1 ). The values of f and lf are [7] where T is the thickness of the thermal boundary layer of
1.0103 Kg m3 and 1.71010 m, respectively. The specific heat convection caused by the nanoparticles Brownian motion,
heat of water at constant pressure is 4.2103 J (Kg K)1 . Then
the values of Re and P r are found to be 4.0 103 and 6.0,
A new model for heat conduction of nanofluids
respectively. If T = 343 K, the values of Re and P r are
1.8 102 and 2.75, respectively. It is seen that the Reynolds
number Re
1. According to Tomotika et al [24], the
Nusselt number for liquid flowing around a spherical particle
can be expressed as Nu = 2.0 + 0.5ReP r + O(Re2 P r 2 ), so
Nu = 2.0 + 0.5ReP r + O(Re2 P r 2 ) 2.0 is applied for
a single particle in this work. We have noted that Jang and
Choi [22] used Nu Re2 P r 2 for the Nusselt number by
assuming that the Reynolds number and the Prandtl numbers
are on the order of 1 and 10, respectively, for typical nanofluids.
However, no details of calculation of the Nusselt number are
provided in Jang and Chois work.
The heat transfer coefficient is defined by h =
(N u kf )/. The heat transferred by convection for a single
nanoparticle moving in liquids is given by
q = hA (Tp Tf ), (3)
where Tp and Tf are the temperatures of particle and liquid,
respectively, A is the surface area of a particle whose diameter
is and A = 2 .
It has been shown that the size distribution of nanoparticles
in nanofluids follows the fractal power law [16]. Analogous to
pores in fractal porous media, the number of particles whose
sizes are within the infinitesimal range +d can be obtained
as [26, 27]
(Df +1)
dN = Df D max
f
d. (4)
In equation (4), dN > 0, which implies the number of
particles decreases with the increase in particle size. The
fractal dimension Df is determined by
ln
Df = d , (5)
ln(min /max )
where d = 2 in two dimensions, is the concentration
of nanoparticles and min and max are the minimum and
maximum diameters of nanoparticles, respectively. Wang
et al [16] measured the SiO2 ethanol nanofluid and obtained
the fractal dimension 1.57 for nanoparticles when is about
6.5%. From equation (5), it is estimated min /max 103 .
Feng et al [28] compared the fractal dimension by equation
(5) with the experimental data by several investigators on the
fractal dimensions versus the fractions of pores and found
in porous media are analogous to the particles in nanofluids,
then equation (5) can also be used to describe the particles in
nanofluids and the ratio of min /max = 103 is thus applied
for nanoparticles in this work.
So the heat transferred by convection of all particles in the
liquid can be found from

max
max
qc = q dN = hA (Tp Tf ) dN
min min

max
T
= hA T dN , (6)
min T
T /P r [22] and T = Tp Tf . In equation (6), we have
assumed the local thermal equilibrium. The laminar boundary
4487
J Xu et al

layer can be approximated by = 3df [29], where df is the 1.45

diameter of liquid molecule. Al2O3-water(13nm,experiment)[2]
1.40
The equivalent thermal conductivity contributed by heat CuO-water(28.6nm,experiment)[3]
convection is approximated by 1.35 Al2O3-water(present model)
 max  max 1.30 CuO-water(present model)
qc min hA T dN hA T dN
kc = = = minmax , (7) 1.25
A T
T A

knf / kf
min A dN
1.20
where A is the total area of nanoparticles.
The total dimensionless effective thermal conductivity of 1.15
nanofluids is then 1.10
knf kp + 2kf 2(kf kp )
= ks+ + kc+ = 1.05
kf kp + 2kf + (kf kp )
1.00
 max 0.00 0.01 0.02 0.03 0.04 0.05
1 min hA T dN
+  max , (8) Particle volume fraction
kf
min A dN
 max  max Figure 1. The dimensionless effective thermal conductivity versus
where ks+ = kkfs and kc+ = kkcf = (1/kf )( min hA T dN/ min the concentration of nanoparticles.
A dN).
The dimensionless thermal conductivity kc+ can be Equation (11) is a function of average nanoparticle size,
obtained by combining equations (3)(4) and (7)(8) as minimum and maximum nanoparticle sizes, fluid property,
temperature, concentration and fractal dimension. It is
1Df
max min
Nu df 2 Df 1D f evident that no new empirical constant is introduced and
kc+ = c 2D , (9) every parameter has clear physical meaning in equation (11).
Pr 1 Df max f 2D
min
f

Equation (11) explicitly denotes that the dimensionless thermal

where c is an empirical constant. Equation (9) is the fractal conductivity of nanofluids due to heat convection by Brownian
model for the dimensionless thermal conductivity caused motion of nanoparticles is proportional to ( )1 . Note that
by heat convection due to Brownian motion. There is no the fractal dimension is also related to the concentration of
new empirical constant introduced in equation (9) except the nanoparticles (see equation (5)) and Prandtl number P r is
parameter c, which is relevant to the thickness of thermal related to temperature.
boundary layer, i.e. T /P r. The Nusselt number is taken The total dimensionless effective thermal conductivity of
to be 2.0 in equation (9). nanofluids based on equations (1), (2) and (11) can be written as
The average diameter of nanoparticles can be found from knf kp + 2kf 2(kf kp )
the statistical property of fractal media, and it is = ks+ + kc+ =
kf kp + 2kf + (kf kp )

   2
Df min 
= f ()d = max , (10a) max
1Df
1
Df 1 max Nu df (2 Df )Df min 1
+c  2Df
. (12)
where f () = Df D (Df +1) Pr (1 Df )2
f
min is the density distribution max
min
1
function [26]. Equation (10a) can be also rewritten as
Equation (12) indicates that the total dimensionless effective
 1
Df 1 min thermal conductivity knf /kf varies with the Prandtl number P r,
max = , (10b) the diameter df of molecule of fluids, the concentration, fractal
Df max
dimension and sizes of nanoparticles. Since min /max =
Df 1 103 is used in this work, once the concentration is
min = . (10c)
Df given/measured, the fractal dimension Df can be found from
equation (5) and the thermal conductivity can be found from
From equations (10a)-(10c) it is seen that due to min /max =
equation (12) as long as the parameters P r, df , kf and kp are
103 , once the fraction/concentration and mean diameter of
known.
nanoparticles are given/measured, the fractal dimension Df
can be determined by equation (5), and the maximum or Figures 1 and 2 compare the model (equation (12)) predic-
minimum diameter of nanoparticles can be determined by tions with the available experimental data (experimental infor-
equations (10b) or (10c). mation is at room temperature, P r = 6.0, kf = 0.610W mK1
With the help of equation (10a)(10c) the dimensionless and df = 1.7 1010 m for water; P r = 20.6, kf =
thermal conductivity caused by heat convection can be 0.258W mK1 and df 1.7 1010 m for ethylene glycol; kp
obtained from equation (9) as are 46.0 W mK1 for Al2 O3 nanoparticles and 69.0 W mK1
 2 for CuO nanoparticles, respectively.), and good agreement is
1Df
found between them. Figure 1 also clearly indicates that the
max
1
Nu df (2 Df ) Df min 1 thermal conductivity of the nanofluids increases with the in-
kc+ = c  2Df .
Pr (1 Df ) 2
crease in nanoparticles concentration and with the decrease
max
min
1 in nanoparticle sizes. It should be noted that there is an em-
(11) pirical parameter c in equation (12) because of uncertainty of

4488
 A new model for heat conduction of nanofluids

1.40 expremental data(CuO-water,28.4nm)[3]

Al2O3-water(13nm)[2]
expremental data(Al2O3-water,11nm)[7]
1.35 Al2O3-water(60.4nm)[4] 1.50
expremental data(Al2O3-water,47nm)[7]
CuO-water(28.6nm)[3] 1.45
1.30 Al2O3-EG(35nm)[5] present model(CuO-water,28.4nm)
Experiment data

1.40 present model(Al2O3-water,11nm)

CuO-EG(35nm)[5]
1.25 present model(Al2O3-water,47nm)
CuO-EG(30nm)[6] 1.35
1.20 line of slope =1
1.30

knf / kf
1.15 1.25

1.10 1.20
1.15
1.05
1.10
1.00 1.05
1.00 1.05 1.10 1.15 1.20 1.25 1.30 1.35 1.40
Present model prediction 1.00
290 295 300 305 310 315 320 325 330 335 340
Figure 2. A comparison of the present model predictions with the Temperature (K)
experimental data.
Figure 4. The effective thermal conductivity of nonofluids versus
temperature at = 0.01.
2.0
The effective thermal conductivity

1.9 +
H-C model,ks (Al2O3-water)
1.8
present model
1.7
1.6
1.5
1.4
1.3
1.2
1.1
1.0
0 5 10 15 20 25 30 35 40 45 50 55 60 65 70 75 80
Nanoparticle average diameter (nm)
Figure 3. The effective thermal conductivity (knf /kf ) versus the
nanoparticles sizes at = 0.03.
the value of T , T /P r, which is primarily related to the
character of liquids. We determine the values of c in our model
to predict the thermal conductivities of nanofluids by matching
with the experimental data. We find that the values of c are
related to fluids. When different nanoparticles are added in the
same fluid, the values of c are same; for example, the value
of c is 85.0 both for the Al2 O3 nanoparticles and for the CuO
nanoparticles added in the deionized water. However, when
the same nanoparticles are added in different fluids, the values
of c are different, e.g. c = 85.0 for the deionized water and
c = 280.0 for the ethylene glycol. This means that the value
of c is independent of the particles added in the fluids and is
only relevant to fluids, which is consistent with the other ob-
servations [18]. The order of magnitude of c is about 102 . This
is primarily because we take Nu 2.0 (for a single particle)
in calculation. Whereas Brodkey et al [30] pointed out that
the Nusselt number Nu for whole nanofluid should be 20100
times of a single nanoparticle.
3. Results and discussion
Taking the nanofluid of the deionized water with the Al2 O3
nanoparticles as an example, figure 3 shows that the total
effective thermal conductivity (knf /kf ) decreases with the
increase in nanoparticles sizes. This phenomenon can be
explained by the theory of Brownian motion: the smaller the
average size of nanoparticles in the fluid, the higher the velocity
of nanoparticles Brownian motion. Thus, the heat transferred
by heat convection is enhanced. It is also interestingly seen
from figure 3 that when the particle size is less than about
15 nm, the effective thermal conductivity increases drastically.
When the diameter of nanoparticles is 5 nm, the thermal
conductivity contributed from the heat convection takes about
20% in total thermal conductivity, whereas the HC model
gives 1.10. This exactly shows that the present model is
more suitable than the HC model to describe the thermal
conductivity of nanofluids and the thermal conductivity of
nanofluids is enhanced greatly. In addition, equation (12) also
shows that since the Prandtl number varies with the change in
temperature, it is expected that the value of knf /kf might change
with the temperature of nanofluids. Therefore, equation (12)
provides the reasonable result. Figure 4 clearly shows that
the value of knf /kf increases with temperature. But the HC
model is not relevant to temperature. Figure 4 also compares
the present model predictions with the available experimental
data [3, 7] on the deionized water with different nanoparticles
for the thermal conductivity knf /kf versus temperature. It is
seen that the model predictions present good agreement with
the experimental data for nanofluids suspended with Al2 O3
particles and fair agreement with the experimental data for
nanofluids suspended with CuO particles, and overall good
agreement between the model predictions and the experimental
data is found.
The contributions from convection (i.e. from the second
term in equation (12)) to the total thermal conductivity are
shown in figure 5, in which we take the nanofluids of
Al2 O3 water with the average diameters of 5.0 nm, 13.0 nm,
30.0 nm and 60.0 nm, respectively. It is again found from
the figure that the contributions from the heat convection
due to nanoparticles Brownian motion increase with the
decrease in nanoparticle sizes. The maximum values of the
contributions from the heat convection are about 21% and
2.1%, respectively, for the nanoparticles with the average

4489
J Xu et al
0.20 5nm
13nm
30nm
60nm
0.15
kc / knf
0.10
0.05
0.00
0.0 0.1 0.2 0.3 0.4 0.5 0.6 0.7 0.8 0.9 1.0
Concentration()
Figure 5. The contributions from the second term in equation (12)
versus the concentration of nanoparticles.
diameters of 5.0 and 60.0 nm. It is also interestingly found that
there is a critical concentration of nanoparticles, at which the
contribution from the convection reaches the maximum value,
below which the contribution from the convection increases
with the concentration and above which the contribution from
the convection decreases with the increase in the concentration.
It is found that the critical concentration is 12.6% for all
nanoparticles, i.e. the critical concentration is independent
of nanoparticle sizes. It can be also seen from figure 5
that when the concentration of nanoparticles continuously
increases, the contribution from the convection tends to zero
because at higher concentration the nanoparticles may be
easily agglomerated to form clusters, and the strength of the
Brownian motion is weakened, leading to the decrease in heat
convection and even to zero (if = 1, the fluid becomes a
solidsolid medium and thermal conductivity is completely
determined by the HC model, with no convection at all).
4. Conclusions
Based on the fractal distribution of nanoparticles and heat
convection between the nanoparticles and fluid due to the
Brownian motion of nanoparticles in fluids, a fractal model
for the effective thermal conductivities of nanofluids has been
proposed. The proposed model is expressed as a function of the
average size of nanoparticles, fractal dimension, concentration
of nanoparticles and temperature and properties of fluids. No
new empirical constant is introduced in the proposed model and
every parameter in this model has a clear physical meaning.
It is found that the parameter c introduced later in the thermal
boundary is related to fluids, but independent of nanoparticles
added in the fluids. It is also found that the thermal
conductivity contributed by heat convection due to Brownian
movement of nanoparticles increases as the concentration
of nanoparticles is less than the critical concentration of
12.6%, at which the contribution from heat convection reaches
the maximum value, and decreases as the concentration of
4490
nanoparticles is higher than the critical concentration of
12.6%. The model predictions are compared with the available
experimental data, and good agreement between the model
predictions and experimental data is found.
Acknowledgments
This work was supported by the National Natural Science
Foundation of China through Grant number 10572052.
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