MIXED CONVECTION OVER AN ISOTHERMAL VERTICAL FLAT PLATE EMBEDDED IN A POROUS MEDIUM WITH MAGNETIC FIELD, RADIATION AND VARIABLE VISCOSITY WITH HEAT GENERATION

This paper focuses on the numerical solutions of the effects of magnetic field, radiation, variable viscosity and heat generation on similarity solutions of mixed convection adjacent to an isothermal vertical plate which is embedded in a porous medium. A similarity transformation is used to reduce the partial differential equations governing the problem into ordinary differential equations and the equations are solved numerically subject to appropriate boundary conditions by the use of Runge-Kutta-Gill method together with a shooting technique. The flow and heat transfer quantities of similarity equations are found to be the functions of C,Rd, ,Q ? ? and RP where C is the magnetic interaction parameter, Rd is the radiation parameter, ? ? is viscosity variation coefficient, Q is the heat generation/absorption parameter and RP is the mixed convection parameter which is the ratio of Rayleigh to pe?clet numbers. In the present work the cases of assisting and opposing flows are discussed. It has been found that in opposing flow case, dual solutions exist for negative values of RP and boundary layer separation occurs. It is observed that depending on the values of RP there exists no solution, a unique solution or dual solutions and also the temperature decreases significantly with increase in Q and C. Skin friction, heat transfer coefficient, velocity and temperature fields are studied and discussed with the help of a table and graphs.