Nusselt Numbers for Poiseuille Flow Over Isoflux Parallel Ridges for Arbitrary Meniscus Curvature

Abstract

We numerically compute Nusselt numbers for laminar, hydrodynamically, and thermally fully developed Poiseuille flow of liquid in the Cassie state through a parallel plate-geometry microchannel symmetrically textured by a periodic array of isoflux ridges oriented parallel to the flow. Our computations are performed using an efficient, multiple domain, Chebyshev collocation (spectral) method. The Nusselt numbers are a function of the solid fraction of the ridges, channel height to ridge pitch ratio, and protrusion angle of menisci. Significantly, our results span the entire range of these geometrical parameters. We quantify the accuracy of two asymptotic results for Nusselt numbers corresponding to small meniscus curvature, by direct comparison against the present results. The first comparison is with the exact solution of the dual series equations resulting from a small boundary perturbation (Kirk et al., 2017, “Nusselt Numbers for Poiseuille Flow Over Isoflux Parallel Ridges Accounting for Meniscus Curvature,” J. Fluid Mech., 811, pp. 315–349). The second comparison is with the asymptotic limit of this solution for large channel height to ridge pitch ratio.