This paper presents an experimental investigation of the thermal transport phenomena in buoyancy-driven nanofluids. The experimental model for this study is a rectangular enclosure with differentially heated vertical walls and adiabatic horizontal walls. The nanofluids were confined within the enclosure. Simulations were performed to measure the transient and steady-state temperature response of the nanofluids to applied load. Experimental observation shows settling of the nanoparticle at low heat loads and a remixing of the nanofluid at higher loads. At high loads, the buoyancy force increased hence increasing the re-circulatory motion of the nanofluid. This may be one method of addressing the settling of nanoparticles in nanofluid. For natural convection in an enclosure, this paper shows that the thermal behavior of nanofluids is identical to pure fluids. Temperature data collected during the experiment were used to study the variation of Nusselt number with Rayleigh number.

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