Effect of Thermal Radiation on Natural Convection Cooling in a Protruding Heater Channel

Resumo

Electronic devices are becoming smaller every time and also more powerful, which leads to greater
amount of heat that needs to be dissipated. Cooling systems by natural convection do not need power and do
not involve movable parts to work, therefore they are simpler and cheaper to build and maintain. This paper
investigates numerically the effects of radiation on a cooling system by natural convection. The problem is assumed
as bidimensional and the geometry is formed by two parallel plates and there is a protruding heater in one of them,
while the other one is insulated. The heat flux from the module is responsible by driving the flow inside the
channel. For laminar natural convection, effects of radiation on the cooling were investigated. At first, neglecting
thermal radiation, the numerical results, were validated with the literature. After validation, thermal radiation was
taking account and the effects of emissivity and width channel on Nusselt number were computed and compared
with those without radiation.