Substituting Hydrofluorocarbons with natural refrigerants in domestic refrigerators will significantly reduce the direct contributions of fluorinated gases to global warming which will be of great environmental benefit. In this study, the performances of dimethyl-ether (RE170) and its azeotropic mixtures (R510A and R511A) in a refrigeration system were assessed theoretically and compare with that of conventional refrigerant. The study revealed that the three investigated alternative refrigerants exhibited significantly good heat transfer characteristics, low pressure ratio, high latent heat in the liquid phase which resulted in their high thermal conductivity and Volumetric Cooling Capacity (VCC). The thermal conductivity of the refrigerants reduces while the evaporating temperature rises and the value obtained for RE170 was the highest among the four refrigerants studied. The Coefficient of Performance (COP) for RE170, R510A and R511A were higher than that of R134a by 6.20, 10.06 and 3.02 % respectively while their power consumptions per ton of refrigeration were lower than that of R134a by 6.99, 11.04 and 1.47 % respectively. In conclusion, dimethyl-ether and its azeotropic mixtures performed better than R134a in that they have higher thermal conductivity, refrigerating effect, VCC, COP, lower power consumption per ton of refrigeration and hence, they can be considered as suitable replacements for R134a in domestic refrigerator.

The study examines the population-level impact of temperature variability and immigration on malaria prevalence in Nigeria, using a novel deterministic model. The model incorporates disease transmission by immigrants into the community. In the absence of immigration, the model is shown to exhibit the phenomenon of backward bifurcation. The disease-free equilibrium of the autonomous version of the model was found to be locally asymptotically stable in the absence of infective immigrants. However, the model exhibits an endemic equilibrium point when the immigration parameter is greater than zero. The endemic equilibrium point is seen to be globally asymptotically stable in the absence of disease-induced mortality. Uncertainty and sensitivity analysis of the model, using parameter values and ranges relevant to malaria transmission dynamics in Nigeria, shows that the top three parameters that drive malaria prevalence (with respect to [Formula: see text]) are the mosquito natural death rate ([Formula: see text]), mosquito biting rate ([Formula: see text]) and the transmission rates between humans and mosquitoes ([Formula: see text]). Numerical simulations of the model show that in Nigeria, malaria burden increases with increasing mean monthly temperature in the range of 22–28[Formula: see text]. Thus, this study suggests that control strategies for malaria should be intensified during this period. It is further shown that the proportion of infective immigrants has marginal effect on the transmission dynamics of the disease. Therefore, the simulations suggest that a reduction in the fraction of infective immigrants, either exposed or infectious, would significantly reduce the malaria incidence in a population.