Numerical Study on Flow and Heat Transfer Performance of a New Type of Biomimetic Tube

The turbulent flow and heat transfer performance of the biomimetic tube was numerically investigated with the non-dimensional parameters (relative depth h/D and arranging density d²/pl ) varied. Compared with dimpled tubes, the simulation results showed that the protrusion of the biomimetic tube increased the velocity magnitude in diameter direction and intensified the mixing of the fluids, which led to a better heat transfer performance. In the range of 1×10⁴~4×10⁴ for Re, the Nu for the enhanced tube was 11%~113% higher than that for smooth tube, while the friction factors was increased by 49%~272%. As a result, the performance evaluation factor of the biomimetic tube ranged from 0.45 to 1.13. At low flow rate, the working points are located in the region 4, which indicates an excellent heat transfer performance. Further, the empirical formulas for Nu and f were respectively fitted in terms of the non-dimensional parameters (relative depth h/D, arranging density d²/pl and Reynold number Re) with the errors within 10%. It was observed that the biomimetic tube could achieve profound heat transfer enhancement with acceptable pressure loss penalty.