Throughflow and Gravity Modulation Effects on Heat Transport in a Porous Medium

The effect of vertical throughflow and time-periodic gravity field has been investigated on Darcy convection. The amplitude of gravity modulation is considered to be very small and the disturbances are expanded in terms of power series of amplitude of convection. A weak nonlinear stability analysis has been performed for the stationary mode of convection. As a consequence heat transport evaluated in terms of the Nusselt number, which is governed by the non-autonomous Ginzburg-Landau equation. Throughflow can stabilize or destabilize the system for stress free and isothermal boundary conditions. The amplitude and frequency of modulation, Prandtl Darcy number on heat transport have been analyzed and depicted graphically. Further, the study establishes that the heat transport can be controlled effectively by a mechanism that is external to the system. Finally flow patterns are presented in terms of streamlines and isotherms.