Thermal performance of ethylene glycol based nanofluids in an electronic heat sink

Heat transfer in electronic devices such as micro processors and power converters is much essential to keep these devices cool for the better functioning of the systems. Air cooled heat sinks are not able to remove the high heat flux produced by the today's electronic components. Liquids work better than air in removing heat. Thermal conductivity which is the most essential property of any heat transfer fluid can be enhanced by adding nano scale solid particles which possess higher thermal conductivity than the liquids. In this work the convective heat transfer and pressure drop characteristics of the water/ethylene glycol mixture based nanofluids consisting of Al2O3, CuO nanoparticles with a volume concentration of 0.1% are studied experimentally in a rectangular channel heat sink. The nano particles are characterized using Scanning Electron Microscope and the nannofluids are prepared by using an ultrasonic vibrator and Sodium Lauryl Salt surfactant. The experimental results showed that nanofluids of 0.1% volume concentration give higher convective heat transfer coefficient values than the plain water/ethylene glycol mixture which is prepared in the volume ratio of 70:30. There is no much penalty in the pressure drop values due to the inclusion of nano particles in the water/ethylene glycol mixture.