Finite element simulations of incompressible flow past a heated/cooled sphere

This paper reports numerical simulation of the flow past a heated/cooled sphere. A Galerkin finite element method is used to solve the 3D incompressible Boussinesq equations in primitive variable form. Numerical simulations of flow around the sphere for a range of Grashof numbers and moderate Reynolds numbers, were conducted. The drag coefficient for adiabatic flow shows good agreement with standard correlations over the range of the Reynolds numbers investigated. It is shown that the drag can vary considerably with heating of the sphere and that computational fluid dynamics methods can be used to derive constitutive laws for macroscopic momentum and heat exchange in multiphase flow.