Numerical studies of boiling in nanofluids exposed to thermal radiation

Photothermal boiling in nanofluids is an energy-efficient process finding multiple promising applications in medicine, space technology, laser printing and nuclear engineering. The most important field is though solar energy where the nanoparticle-driven boiling of the base fluid drives a nano-turbine or a distillator. Hundreds of experimental and theoretical studies has been conducted in this direction over the past decade. There is however no reliable theory that describes kinetics of the process. The present contribution presents a numerical model of the process of photo-thermal evaporation in aqueous nanofluids. The model was used to predict the evaporation rate depending on concentration of the nanoparticles. The simulation results were compared with the experimental data over a range of concentrations (up to 10% wt.), demonstrating suitable agreement with the experiment.