High flux heat removal with microchannels - A roadmap of challenges and opportunities
Abstract
Heat fluxes in IC chips and other electronics equipment
have reached the current limits of air cooling technology.
Some of the applications require heat fluxes well beyond the
limit of 100 W/cm2, requiring advanced cooling solutions.
Liquid cooling technology has been receiving attention as the
advances in single-phase liquid cooling in microchannels have
shown considerable promise. The extension of comp act heat
exchanger technology to microscale applications offers many
new possibilities. The liquid cooling technology is expected to
reach heat dissipation rates as high as 10 MW/m2 (1 kW/cm2)
with enhanced microchannels (with a junction-to-air
temperature difference of 50 °C). The challenges facing flow
boiling systems are also evaluated. This paper reviews the
fundamental technological developments in liquid cooling as
well as in flow boiling, and presents possible solutions in
integrating the cooling system with a building’s HVAC unit in
a large server type application. The opportunities and
challenges are described in an attempt to provide the roadmap
of cooling technology for cooling high flux devices in the next
decade.