Effect of non-uniform heat source on MHD heat transfer in a liquid film over an unsteady stretching sheet

Abstract

An analysis has been carried out to study the magnetohydrodynamic boundary layer flow and heat transfer characteristics of a laminar liquid film over a flat impermeable stretching sheet in the presence of a non-uniform heat source/sink. The basic unsteady boundary layer equations governing the flow and heat transfer are in the form of partial differential equations. These equations are converted to non-linear ordinary differential equations using similarity transformation. Numerical solutions of the resulting boundary value problem are obtained by the efficient shooting technique. The effects of magnetic and the non-uniform heat source/sink parameters on the dynamics are discussed. Findings of the paper reveal that non-uniform heat sinks are better suited for effective cooling of the stretching sheet. Skin friction coefficient and the local Nusselt number are also explored for typical values of magnetic and non-uniform heat source/sink parameters. The results are in excellent agreement with the earlier published works, under some limiting cases. © 2009 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.