The Nusselt number (Nu) is a dimensionless quantity used in heat transfer to characterize the convective heat transfer relative to conductive heat transfer. It is defined as the ratio of convective to conductive heat transfer across a boundary, and it helps to quantify the enhancement of heat transfer due to convection. Mathematically, it can be expressed as:
where is the convective heat transfer coefficient, is a characteristic length (such as the diameter of a pipe), and is the thermal conductivity of the fluid. A higher Nusselt number indicates a more effective convective heat transfer, which is crucial in designing systems such as heat exchangers and cooling systems. In practical applications, the Nusselt number can be influenced by factors such as fluid flow conditions, temperature gradients, and surface roughness.
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