Journal of the Korean Physical Society, Vol. 51, October 2007, pp.

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Thermal Conductivity of Al2 O3 /Water Nanouids

Dae-Hwang Yoo
Research Center for Dielectric and Advanced Matter Physics, Pusan National University, Busan 609-735

K. S. Hong and T. E. Hong

Busan Center, Korea Basic Science Institute, Busan 609-735

J. A. Eastman
Materials Science Division, Argonne National Laboratory, Argonne, IL 60439, U.S.A.

Ho-Soon Yang
Department of Physics, Pusan National University, Busan 609-735 Nanouids, uids with suspended nanoparticles, are of interest as a novel material for improving heat transfer eciency. The conventional theory of two-component mixtures cannot explain the large enhancement of thermal conductivity of nanouids. It is to be expected that the thermal conductivity of nanouids is related with many factors, such as that eect of surfactants, dispersion of particles, convection or Brownian motion of nanoparticles, etc. but the mechanism is not known. Thermal conductivity of Al2 O3 nanouids is studied in this work and compared with that of Fe nanouids. To study the eect of pH of the base uid on thermal conductivity, we measured the thermal conductivity of Al2 O3 nanouids with dierent pH values. Al2 O3 nanoparticles were dispersed in water of pH values such as 7.0, 9.65 and 10.94. Nanoparticles have a tendency to form clusters, due to van der Waals interaction resulting in reduction of thermal conductivity. It is understood from the variation of thermal conductivity as the pH value of base uids varies that the pH of base uids aects clustering of nanoparticles.
PACS numbers: 66.60.+a Keywords: Nanouid, Thermal conductivity, Hot-wire method

I. INTRODUCTION It has been an important issue to increase the eciency of heat exchange systems. Heat transfer uids such as oil, water, etc., show poor heat conduction properties. Since thermal conductivity of heat transfer uids is critical in determining the eciency of an engine, numerous methods have been adopted to improve thermal conductivity of heat transfer uids. Crystalline solids have much higher thermal conductivity than uids. Therefore, uids containing solid particles have been expected to display signicantly enhanced thermal conductivity, relative to pure uids. Nanosystems have been developed and studied intensively in wide areas, because of their characteristic properties and potential applications [1,2]. As nanotechnology developed, it was proposed that uids containing nanometer-sized particles could be a new class of engineered uids with high thermal conductivity [3]. These
E-mail:

hsyang@pusan.ac.kr

nanoparticle-suspended uids, named nanouids, have been produced as nanotechnology developed rapidly, and many papers have reported enhancement of thermal conductivity of nanouids [47]. Increase of thermal conductivity was observed in a large number of nanouids, such as CuO, Cu, and Al2 O3 nanouids [5]. CuO nanouids showed a 22 % increase of thermal conductivity [4]. Large enhancement of thermal conductivity of nanouids could not be predicted by conventional theories on the eective thermal conductivity of two-component materials [812]. The exact mechanism of thermal transport in nanouids is not known at this moment, even though several potential mechanisms have been suggested to describe experimental results on thermal conductivity of nanouids. Many factors, such as Brownian motion of nanoparticles, particle size, eect of surfactants, dispersion of particles, and thermal properties of dispersed particles, have been expected to inuence the thermal properties of nanouids [13]. Large surface-to-volume ratio of nanoparticles, compared with micro-sized particles, can lead to potential signicant enhancement of thermal con-S84-

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ductivity of uids [14]. In this work, we present the enhancement of thermal conductivity of nanouids containing Fe and Al2 O3 nanoparticles. We also report the enhancement of thermal conductivity of nanouids prepared with base uids of dierent pH values. We also compare the experimental results with those of model calculations.

II. EXPERIMENTAL WORK Fe and Al2 O3 nanouids used in this work were prepared by a two-step procedure. Nanoparticles were synthesized by a chemical vapor condensation process and the average sizes of Fe and Al2 O3 particles are 10 nm and 50 nm, respectively. Ethylene glycol (EG) was used for Fe nanouids as a base uid, and water was used for Al2 O3 nanouids. Nanoparticles form clusters in nanouids, which leads to poor dispersion [18]. In order to improve the dispersion of particles in the uid, we used an ultrasonic cell disrupter (Jeiotech, ULH-700S) generating ultrasonic pulses of 700 W at 20 kHz. Sonicating time was dierent for dierent volume fractions of nanoparticles: 50 min. for 0.3 and 0.5 vol.% nanouids, 70 min. for 0.7 vol.% nanouid, and 90 min. for 1.0 and 1.5 vol.% nanouids. Al2 O3 nanouids were prepared with base uids having dierent pH values. NaOH solution was used to change the pH values of the nanouids. Properties of nanouids and the volume fractions used in the experiments are shown in Table 1. Thermal conductivity of nanouids was measured with a transient hot-wire (THW) method, which is one of the most accurate methods for determining thermal conductivity of uids [15, 16]. A Teon-coated pure (99.9 %) platinum wire was used in the measurement. The wire was used as both heater and thermometer. We measured the thermal conductivity of the nanouids as a function of volume fraction of particles after sonication.

Fig. 1. XRD and TEM of Al2 O3 nanoparticles. (a) XRD data; (b) TEM.

III. RESULTS AND DISCUSSION Figure 1(a) and (b) present an X-ray diraction (XRD) pattern and a TEM image of Al2 O3 nanoparticles, respectively. The XRD result shows that Al2 O3 nanoparticles are formed in a structure. From the TEM image, we nd that the nanoparticles are spheres and have a broad size distribution. Figure 2 represents thermal conductivity of Fe nanouids and Al2 O3 nanouids as a function of volume fraction of nanoparticles. The y -axis represents the ratio of thermal conductivity of nanouid to that of base uid. The thermal conductivity increases as the volume fraction increases. 0.55 vol.% Fe nanouid shows 18 % enhancement of thermal

conductivity, and 1.0 vol.% Al2 O3 exhibits about 4 % enhancement. We are not able to explain the further enhancement of thermal conductivity of Fe nanouids without knowing the exact mechanism of thermal transport in nanouids. Suspending smaller particles is more eective to improve thermal conductivity of nanouids, because the surface-to-volume ratio of particles increases as particle size decreases. The intrinsic thermal conductivity of Fe (80 W/m-K) is much higher than that of Al2 O3 (30 W/m-K). We understand that thermal conductivity of Fe nanouids is enhanced more than that of Al2 O3 nanouids, due to the smaller size and also higher intrinsic thermal conductivity of the particles. Figure 3 shows thermal conductivity of Al2 O3 /pH nanouid prepared with water of dierent pH values. The nanouid of pH 10.94 exhibits higher thermal conductivity than the others. This result implies that controlling the pH of uids can lead to an increase of thermal conductivity of nanouids. In general, nanoparticles form clusters due to van der Waals interaction. We presume that the surface charge of nanoparticles in high-pH

-S86Table 1. Properties of nanouids used in experiments. Sample Base uid Average particle size Volume fraction Notation

Journal of the Korean Physical Society, Vol. 51, October 2007

Al2 O3 water, pH solution 50 nm 0.3, 0.5, 0.7, 1.0, 1.5 Al2 O3 /water, Al2 O3 /pH

Fe ethylene glycol (EG) 10 nm 0.2, 0.3, 0.4, 0.55 Fe/EG

Fig. 2. Thermal conductivity of Fe and Al2 O3 nanouids as a function of volume fraction of nanoparticles.

tures, and compared those values with the experimental results [9]. Figure 4 represents a comparison of the calculations and experimental results as a function of particle volume fraction. The lines in Figure 4(b) represent linear tted results for the data. In the case of the Fe nanouid, the experimental results show higher thermal conductivity than those of the H-C model calculation by more than 10 %. In the case of the Al2 O3 /water nanouid, the result of the model calculation diers from that for the Fe nanouid. The experimental values are nearly the same as those of the model calculation, which means that the thermal conduction behavior of the Al2 O3 /water nanouid follows the classical theory in this volume fraction region. Other researchers reported that Al2 O3 nanouid showed larger enhancement of thermal conductivity in the higher volume fraction region [17]. However, as we expected, nanouids synthesized by controlling the pH of the solution show a tendency of an increase with larger enhancement compared to the result of the H-C model calculation, and the degree of enhancement increases with volume fraction. At 1.5 % volume fraction, Al2 O3 /pH nanouid shows about 7 % increase of thermal conductivity relative to the model calculation result. This implies that controlling the pH of the nanouid can lead to enhancement of thermal conductivity.

IV. CONCLUSIONS The thermal conductivity of Al2 O3 nanouids was studied and compared with that of Fe nanouids. Al2 O3 nanouids show thermal conductivity close to the value predicted by the H-C model, while the thermal conductivity of Fe nanouids is improved more than as predicted by the H-C model. To study the eect of pH of base uid on thermal conductivity, we measured the thermal conductivity of Al2 O3 nanouids with dierent pH values and observed that thermal conductivity is improved by controlling the pH value of the nanouids. It is thus found that thermal conductivity of nanouids is improved by controlling pH values of nanouids. In order to understand the pH-dependent thermal conductivity, we need further study. This work will contribute to understanding a mechanism of thermal transport, which will facilitate eective enhancement of thermal conductivity of nanouids.

Fig. 3. Thermal conductivity of Al2 O3 /water and Al2 O3 / pH nanouids, related to volume fraction and pH values.

nanouids hinders clustering of nanoparticles, which results in smaller clusters. The change of cluster size of nanoparticles can be observed by means of light scattering, and such measurements will be made in our next work. We calculated thermal conductivity for Fe and Al2 O3 nanouids by using the Hamilton-Crosser (H-C) model which is a conventional model for two-component mix-

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tion Grants KRF-2003-015-C00227 and KRF-2004-005C00065.

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Fig. 4. Comparison of experimental results with H-C model calculation. (a) Fe; (b) Al2 O3 .

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS This work was supported by Korean Research Founda-