MHD Flow of Nanofluids over an Exponentially Stretching Sheet Embedded in a Stratified Medium with Suction and Radiation Effects

An analysis has been carried out to investigate the influence of the combined effects of MHD, suction and radiation on the forced convection boundary layer flow of a nanofluid over an exponentially stretching sheet, embedded in a thermally stratified medium. The governing boundary layer equations of the problem are formulated and transformed into ordinary differential equations, using a similarity transformation. The resulting ordinary differential equations are solved numerically, by the shooting method. The effects of the governing parameters on the flow and heat transfer characteristics are studied and discussed in detail. Different types of nanoparticles, namely, Cu, Ag, Al 2 O 3 and TiO 2 , with water as the base fluid, are studied. It is found that the effects of the radiation parameter, volume fraction and suction are the same on the temperature profiles, in contrast to the effects of thermal stratification. Comparisons with previously published works are performed in some special cases, and found to be in good agreement.