Effects of shear work on non-equilibrium heat transfer characteristics of rarefied gas flows through micro/nanochannels

In the current work, the effect of shear work due to the velocity slip on the non-equilibrium heat transfer in a pressure driven micro/nanochannel is evaluated under the constant wall heat flux boundary condition. As our simulation tool, the DSMC method is employed. Implementation of the wall heat flux in the DSMC method is performed using the "modified Iterative" technique. We investigate the effects of rarefaction, property variations and compressibility. The numerical results show that shear stress on the walls significantly affects all aspects of the flow behavior and heat transfer through micro/nanochannels such as heat flux rates. We also analyze the counter-gradient heat flow (cold to hot heat transfer) phenomenon appearing at the cooling conditions. It is observed that viscous dissipation affects the heat flux applied to the walls and may overcome the wall heat flux, i.e., in the case of low cooling wall heat flux condition, shear work may completely heat the flow field. Nusselt number singularity is also discussed. (C) 2014 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.