Faculty Publications

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    Analysis of forced convection heat transfer through graded PPI metal foams
    (Pleiades journals, 2019) Kotresha, B.; Gnanasekaran, N.
    A forced convection heat transfer through high porosity graded Pores per inch (PPI) metal foam heat exchanger is numerically solved in this paper. The physical domain of the problem consists of a heat exchanger system attached to the bottom of a horizontal channel to absorb heat from the exhaust gas leaving the system. Two different pore densities of the metal foam 20 and 40 along with two different metal foam materials are considered for the enhancement of heat transfer in the present numerical investigation. The metal foam heat exchanger is considered as a homogeneous porous medium and is modeled using Darcy Extended Forchheirmer model. The heat transfer through the metal foam porous media is solved by using local thermal equilibrium (LTE) model. The effect of graded pore density and graded thermal conductivity is investigated and compared with the nongraded PPI metal foam. The heat exchanger system is simulated over a velocity range of 6–30 m/s. The pressure drop decreases for the graded pore density metal foams compared to the higher PPI metal foam and also increases with increase in the fluid inlet velocity. The results of temperature and velocity distribution for the graded and nongraded metal foams are compared and discussed elaborately. © Springer Nature Singapore Pte Ltd. 2019.
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    Natural Convection Through High Porosity Metal Foams—A Numerical Study
    (Springer Science and Business Media Deutschland GmbH, 2021) Kotresha, B.; Jadhav, P.H.; Gnanasekaran, N.
    Numerical analysis of natural convection through highly porous metal foams attached to the aluminium plates is performed in this study. A heater sandwiched between two aluminium plates attached with aluminium metal foams of different pores per inch (PPI) is considered for the present analysis. Initially, experiments are carried out for aluminium plate-heater assembly for different heat inputs. In the numerical investigation, the aluminium plates are attached with metal foams on either side for further analysis. A well-known Darcy extended Forchheimer flow and LTNE thermal models are considered for the metal foam in the computations. The natural convection is modelled using Boussinesq approximation. Initially, the numerical result for the plate without metal foam is validated with the experimental results for different heat inputs. The results show that the Nusselt number decreases with the increase of metal foam pore density (PPI) and increases with the increase in Rayleigh number. © 2021, The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Singapore Pte Ltd.
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    Heat transfer optimization using genetic algorithm and artificial neural network in a heat exchanger with partially filled different high porosity metal foam
    (Elsevier Ltd, 2022) Athith, T.S.; Trilok, G.; Jadhav, P.H.; Gnanasekaran, N.
    The metal foam is well known for its high surface area to volume ratio and thus used to transfer heat from the exhaust gas leaving the heat exchanger system. The present work deals with the numerical simulations of a heat exchanger partially filled with three different metal foams made up of Aluminum (Al), Copper (Cu) and Nickel (Ni) having two pore densities namely 20 PPI and 40 PPI, respectively. The hot gas is made to flow through the 8 mm channel in which metal foams are inserted and different heights of foams such as 2 mm, 4 mm, 6 mm and 8 mm are considered for the analysis. The purpose of this study is to optimize thermal performance by increasing heat transfer and decreasing pressure drop which is calculated from the simulations using a commercial software ANSYS FLUENT. In order to achieve this, a optimization technique called Non-dominated Sorting Genetic Algorithm (NSGA-II) is coded in MATLAB by making use of artificial neural network (ANN tool) as an interpolation tool to generate more data based on the already existing data. Finally, Pareto front is obtained for the optimized functional values of heat transfer and drop in pressure after running the code for NSGA-II. From the numerical simulations it is observed that there is 5.68 times enhancement in heat transfer rate when copper metal foam is used for higher inlet velocities, when compared with non-porous channel. From the optimization study, it is found that 50% filled metal foam porous channel is showing enhanced heat transfer rate with decreased pressure drop as depicted in the pareto optimal plot for copper and aluminium. © 2022 Elsevier Ltd.
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    Investigation of Mixed Convection Heat Transfer Through Metal Foams Partially Filled in a Vertical Channel by Using Computational Fluid Dynamics
    (American Society of Mechanical Engineers (ASME) infocentral@asme.org, 2018) Kotresha, B.; Gnanasekaran, N.
    Two-dimensional computational fluid dynamics simulations of mixed convection heat transfer through aluminum metal foams partially filled in a vertical channel are carried out numerically. The objective of the present study is to quantify the effect of metal foam thickness on the fluid flow characteristics and the thermal performance in a partially filled vertical channel with metal foams for a fluid velocity range of 0.05-3 m/s. The numerical computations are performed for metal foam filled with 40%, 70%, and 100% by volume in the vertical channel for four different pores per inch (PPIs) of 10, 20, 30, and 45 with porosity values varying from 0.90 to 0.95. To envisage the characteristics of fluid flow and heat transfer, two different models, namely, Darcy Extended Forchheirmer (DEF) and Local thermal non-equilibrium, have been incorporated for the metal foam region. The numerical results are compared with experimental and analytical results available in the literature for the purpose of validation. The results of the parametric studies on vertical channel show that the Nusselt number increases with the increase of partial filling of metal foams. The thermal performance of the metal foams is reported in terms of Colburn j and performance factors. © Copyright 2018 by ASME.
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    Comparison of fluid flow and heat transfer through metal foams and wire mesh by using CFD
    (Bentham Science Publishers, 2019) Kotresha, B.; Gnanasekaran, N.
    Background: The unique structural characteristics of the metal foams, such as low density, large surface area, ability to increase turbulence, and increased heat transfer efficiency, are the advantages associated with thermal applications such as electronics cooling, refrigeration air conditioning, etc. The porous metal foam structures are extensively used to enhance heat transfer. Objective: This paper discusses the numerical simulations of a vertical channel filled with metal foam and wire mesh. The fluid flow and heat transfer phenomena of a wire mesh are compared with two different types of metal foams. Metal foams are made of aluminium and copper while the wire mesh is made of brass. The porosity of the metallic porous structures varies from 0.85 to 0.95. Methods: A Darcy extended Forchheirmer model is considered for solving fluid flow through the porous media while the heat transfer through the porous media is predicted using local thermal non-equilibrium model. Results: Initially, the results obtained using the proposed numerical procedures are compared with experimental results available in the literature. The numerical simulations suggest that the pressure drop increases as the velocity of the fluid increases and decreases as the porosity increases. The heat transfer coefficient and Nusselt number are determined for both the metal foams and the wire mesh. Conclusion: The Nusselt number obtained for wire mesh shows almost 90% of the copper metal foam in the same porosity range. The numerical results suggest that the brass wire mesh porous medium can also be used for enhancement of heat transfer. In this article, patents have been discussed. © 2019 Bentham Science Publishers.
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    Effect of thickness and thermal conductivity of metal foams filled in a vertical channel – a numerical study
    (Emerald Publishing, 2019) Kotresha, B.; Gnanasekaran, N.
    Purpose: This paper aims to discuss about the two-dimensional numerical simulations of fluid flow and heat transfer through high thermal conductivity metal foams filled in a vertical channel using the commercial software ANSYS FLUENT. Design/methodology/approach: The Darcy Extended Forchheirmer model is considered for the metal foam region to evaluate the flow characteristics and the local thermal non-equilibrium heat transfer model is considered for the heat transfer analysis; thus the resulting problem becomes conjugate heat transfer. Findings: Results obtained based on the present simulations are validated with the experimental results available in literature and the agreement was found to be good. Parametric studies reveal that the Nusselt number increases in the presence of porous medium with increasing thickness but the effect because of the change in thermal conductivity was found to be insignificant. The results of heat transfer for the metal foams filled in the vertical channel are compared with the clear channel in terms of Colburn j factor and performance factor. Practical implications: This paper serves as the current relevance in electronic cooling so as to open up more parametric and optimization studies to develop new class of materials for the enhancement of heat transfer. Originality/value: The novelty of the present study is to quantify the effect of metal foam thermal conductivity and thickness on the performance of heat transfer and hydrodynamics of the vertical channel for an inlet velocity range of 0.03-3 m/s. © 2018, Emerald Publishing Limited.
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    A Synergistic Combination of Thermal Models for Optimal Temperature Distribution of Discrete Sources Through Metal Foams in a Vertical Channel
    (American Society of Mechanical Engineers (ASME) infocentral@asme.org, 2019) Kotresha, B.; Gnanasekaran, N.
    This paper discusses about the numerical prediction of forced convection heat transfer through high-porosity metal foams with discrete heat sources in a vertical channel. The physical geometry consists of a discrete heat source assembly placed at the center of the channel along with high thermal conductivity porous metal foams in order to enhance the heat transfer. The novelty of the present work is the use of combination of local thermal equilibrium (LTE) model and local thermal nonequilibrium (LTNE) model for the metal foam region to investigate the temperature distribution of the heat sources and to obtain an optimal heat distribution so as to achieve isothermal condition. Aluminum and copper metal foams of 10 PPI having a thickness of 20 mm are considered for the numerical simulations. The metal foam region is considered as homogeneous porous media and numerically modeled using Darcy Extended Forchheimer model. The proposed methodology is validated using the experimental results available in literature. The results of the present numerical solution indicate that the excess temperature of the bottom heat source reduces by 100 °C with the use of aluminum metal foam. The overall temperature of the vertical channel reduces based on the combination of LTE and LTNE models compared to only LTNE model. The results of excess temperature for both the empty and the metal foam filled vertical channels are presented in this work. © 2019 by ASME.
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    Numerical Simulations of Flow-Assisted Mixed Convection in a Vertical Channel Filled with High Porosity Metal Foams
    (Taylor and Francis Ltd., 2020) Kotresha, B.; Gnanasekaran, N.; Balaji, C.
    In this work, two-dimensional numerical simulations of flow-assisted mixed convection in a vertical channel filled with high porosity metal foams have been carried out by using the commercial ANSYS FLUENT. In order to enhance heat transfer, the vertical channel is filled with aluminum metal foams of different pores per inch (PPI). Four different metal foams PPI 10, 20, 30, and 45, with porosity values varying from 0.90 to 0.95 are considered in this study. The geometry under consideration consists of metal foam attached to the aluminum plate in the vertical channel and the resulting problem becomes conjugate heat transfer. The metal foam region is considered as a homogeneous porous medium with the Darcy Extended Forchheirmer model to evaluate the flow characteristics while the local thermal non-equilibrium heat transfer model is considered for the heat transfer analysis. Initially, numerical results are compared with the experimental results available in literature and the agreement was found to be good. Parametric studies show that as the metal foam PPI increases, the pressure drop increases, while the heat transfer is seen to increase with an increase in the pore density of the metal foam. © 2019, © 2019 Taylor & Francis Group, LLC.
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    Numerical Simulations of Fluid Flow and Heat Transfer through Aluminum and Copper Metal Foam Heat Exchanger–A Comparative Study
    (Taylor and Francis Ltd. michael.wagreich@univie.ac.at, 2020) Kotresha, B.; Gnanasekaran, N.
    This article discusses about a numerical simulation of a metal foam heat exchanger system carried out by a commercial software. A metal foam layer is attached to the bottom of the heat exchanger to absorb heat from the exhaust hot gas leaving the system. Two types of metal foams with two different pores per inch (PPI) values are considered for heat transfer enhancement. Similarly, two different materials Aluminum and copper, that poses high thermal conductivity, metal foams are considered for the present numerical simulations. The heat exchanger system is simulated over a range of 6–30 m/s fluid velocity. The proposed simulations are compared with theoretical and experimental data available in the literature. The goal is to improve the thermal performance of the heat exchanger by decreasing the pressure drop and maximizing the heat transfer rate. Finally, it has been noticed that the velocity of the fluid decreases as PPI increases at the expense of its pressure drop. The copper metal foam gives a maximum increase of 4–10% heat transfer rate compared to aluminum metal foams for a fluid velocity of 30 m/s. © 2019, © 2019 Taylor & Francis Group, LLC.
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    Nuances of fluid flow through a vertical channel in the presence of metal foam/solid block – A hydrodynamic analysis using CFD
    (Elsevier Ltd, 2020) Kotresha, B.; Gnanasekaran, N.
    A numerical study is presented in this paper to examine the fluid flow in a vertical channel partly filled with porous metallic foams. The physical model comprises of aluminum plate-heater assembly placed in the vertical channel. Heat is carried away by the working fluid air from the plates inside the vertical channel through forced convection. High thermal conductivity metal foams are attached to the heater-plate assembly in order to reduce the temperature of the aluminum plates. Thus, the study pays attention only to the characteristics of fluid flow at different positions of the vertical channel in the presence of metal foams. The present analysis considers the Forchheimer – Extended Darcy equation for the metal foam to predict the fluid flow in conjunction with the local non-thermal equilibrium model for the analysis of heat transfer through the porous metal foams. At first, the methodology applied to the present numerical analysis is validated with the existing results. Upon reaffirming the solution methodology, the results of the metal foam study are then compared with a solid block that replaces the metal foam structure inside the vertical channel. Consequently, as a novel approach, the analysis enables one to arbitrate the tradeoff between the porous metal foam and the solid block for heat transfer augmentation from the plate assembly to the air. © 2020 Elsevier Ltd