Morphology and thermophysical properties of non-aqueous titania nanofluids

• DOI: 10.1007/s00231-018-2308-4
• Publication Date: 2018-02-16T17:00:03Z
• Authors: S. M. S. Murshed; F. J. V. Santos; C. A. Nieto de Ca...; V. S. Patil; K. R. Patil
• Keywords: Silicone oil

This work deals with the experimental investigation on thermophysical properties of TiO2-nanofluids and characterization of morphology and structure of TiO2 nanoparticles. Non-aqueous liquids like silicone oil and ethylene glycol are used as base fluids to prepare the nanofluids. Thermophysical properties including viscosity and thermal conductivity of these nanofluids are measured at different concentrations and temperatures. Results showed that silicone oil-based TiO2 nanofluid is Newtonian and the viscosity of this nanofluid increases with the loading of nanoparticles but it decreases nonlinearly with increasing temperature. Existing viscosity models are found unable to predict the viscosity of nanofluids. Although the effective thermal conductivities of both the silicone oil and ethylene glycol-based nanofluids increased with the TiO2 concentration, their enhanced thermal conductivity was found to decrease with increasing temperature.