An Experimental Investigation of Thermal Conductivity of TiO2 Nanofluid: Proposing a New Correlation

In this study, TiO2/Water nano fluids were prepared at different concentration by two step method. Zeta potential technique was used to investigate the stability of the colloidal solution of the titanium oxide in the base fluid (water).The effect of temperature (25-50 degrees C) and solid volume concentration (0.5-3.0%) on the thermal conductivity of nanofluid was observed. Based on experimental observation and with curve fitting, a new empirical correlation was proposed for calculating the thermal conductivity of the nanofluid. It was observed that at higher temperature, enhancement in the thermal conductivity of nanofluid was more with an increase in solid volume fraction while at low volume fraction, the effect of raise in temperature on thermal conductivity was observed less. The highest enhancement of 15.69% in thermal conductivity observed with 3.0% volume concentration at 50 degrees C.