The latent heat of the microencapsulated phase change material(MPCM)increases the effective ther-mal capacity of latent functionally thermal fluid.However,researchers found that the heat transfer performance of such fluids was diminished due to the reduction of the low thermal conductivity of MPCM.For this reason,the nanoparticle enhanced latent functionally thermal fluids were formulated and the heat transfer behaviors of these fluids in a vertical circular tube at the laminar regime were conducted.The result showed that slurries containing 0.5% TiO2 nanoparticles by mass and 5%―20% MPCM by mass exhibited improved heat transfer rates in comparison with the conventional latent functionally thermal fluid and that the enhancement increased with the increasing MPCM concentration and up to 18.9% of the dimensionless wall temperature was reduced.
This paper analyzes the convective heat transfer enhancement mechanism of latent heat functionally thermal fluid. By using the proposed internal heat source model, the influence of each factor affecting the heat transfer enhancement of laminar flow in a circular tube with constant heat flux is analyzed. The main influencing factors and the mechanisms of heat transfer enhancement are clarified, and the influences of the main factors on the heat transfer enhancement are quantitatively analyzed. A modified Nusselt number for internal flow is introduced to describe more effectively the degree of heat transfer enhancement for latent functionally thermal fluid.
