Energy transport of two-phase nanofluid approach inside a three-dimensional lid-driven cubic cavity containing solid cylinder and heat source

[Display omitted] •Impacts of two-phase nanofluid model and heat source on 3D mixed convection cubic cavity with solid circular are described.•3D finite element method was applied to solve the dimensionless governing equations in 3D vector forms.•2D and 3D comparisons with the experimental/numerical data are accomplished regarding to the validity of the existing code.•Effects of the solid cylinder radius, heat source length and heat source position are confirmed. The energy transport intensification can be achieved by an addition of nanoparticles to the host liquid. Simultaneously, a location of partial heating and the velocity of moving cavity surface can be control parameters for the thermal transmission. The present research deals with a computational investigation of mixed convective energy transport within a cubical chamber saturated by nanofluids, including the impacts of cold surface motion, local heating, and central heat-conducting cylinder. The governing equations are written using the Buongiorno's nanoliquid approach with the Boussinesq approximation in primitive dimensionless variables and are solved numerically by the finite-element technique. An investigation of the nanoliquid circulation and energy transport has resulted in an extensive range of control characteristics, namely, Reynolds number, Richardson number, nanoparticle volume fraction, dimensionless radius of solid cylinder, dimensionless heat source length and the dimensionless heat source position. It has been observed that a nonlinear impact of nanoparticles volume fraction toward the energy transport strength for high Reynolds number exists. Whilst for low Reynolds number, a growth of the nano-sized particles concentration leads to the energy transference strengthening. At the same time, a rise of the inner cylinder size characterizes a diminution of the heat transport strength.