Abstract:
The effect of pulsatile flow on the momentum and heat transfer characteristics for a sphere in power-law fluids is
investigated numerically otherwise in the steady regime. Extensive results are presented in terms of streamlines,
isotherms, pressure coefficient and local Nusselt number, drag coefficient and Nusselt number over the range of
conditions as: Reynolds number (5 ≤ Re ≤ 120), Prandtl number (0.7 ≤ Pr ≤ 100), power-law index (0.3 ≤ n ≤ 1.5),
frequency (π/4 ≤ ω* ≤ π) and amplitude of pulsations (0 ≤ A ≤ 0.8). The vortex grows during the deceleration
phase of the pulsatile cycle and vice-versa. The pulsatile flow enhances heat transfer in shear-thinning fluids
by 30% (at Re = 120, Pr = 100) over that of uniform flow conditions whereas the corresponding improvement
is smaller than this value for shear-thickening fluids, i.e., n N 1. This is accompanied by a marginal increase in drag
