The onset of convection in a viscoelastic nanofluid layer

This paper presents a linear stability analysis for natural convection in a horizontal layer of viscoelastic nanofluid whose rheological behavior is described by an Oldroyd B model. The effects of Brownian motion and thermophoresis on the motion of nanoparticles are considered. The onset criterion for stationary and oscillatory convection is derived analytically. Results indicate that oscillatory instability is possible in both bottom-heavy and top-heavy nanoparticle distributions. Regimes of stationary and oscillatory convection for various parameters are derived and discussed in detail.