Abstract

A theoretical analysis of steady and unsteady magnetohydrodynamic (MHD) flow of blood through a stenosed artery with variable viscosity and slip conditions is presented in this work. Slip conditions and variable viscosity dependent on hematocrit for both steady and unsteady blood flow models are taken into consideration in this study. The governing equations have been derived by treating blood as incompressible magnetohydrodynamic (MHD) Newtonian fluid. Galerkin Weighted Residual method, Newton Raphson method and fourth order Runge-Kutta method are used to solve the non-linear differential equations for velocity profiles of the blood flow, flow rate, shear stress and flow resistance for different values of hematocrit parameter, magnetic field parameter and slip velocity. The Galerkin Weighted Residual method is applied to transform the partial differential equations describing the flow into systems of non-linear equations and system of non-linear first order differential equations for the time independent and time dependent MHD flow models respectively. Newton Raphson’s method with the aid of maple software is used to solve the system of non-linear equations while the fourth order Runge-Kutta method is used to solve the system of non-linear first order differential equations. The research analyzed how the flow velocity, flow rate, shear stress and resistance to fluid flow respond to changes in some key parameters such as hematocrit parameter, magnetic field parameter and slip velocity. The results as presented graphically reveal that flow velocity and flow rate decrease while shear stress and resistance to flow increase when the hematocrit parameter increases. Also, flow velocity, flow rate and shear stress increase while resistance to flow decrease when the slip velocity increases. Finally, the increase in magnetic field parameter led to a decrease in flow velocity, flow rate and shear stress but increased the flow resistance. The flow velocity of the unsteady blood flow model is higher when compared to steady blood flow model.

Key words: Steady and unsteady MHD blood flow, slip conditions, variable viscosity, magnetic field, flow resistance