Cutting-edge heat pipes for improved electronics cooling

用于改善电子设备冷却的尖端热管

• 批准号: 105241
• 金额: $ 8.87万
• 依托单位: MYRIOFOAM LIMITED
• 依托单位国家: 英国
• 项目类别: Feasibility Studies
• 财政年份: 2019
• 资助国家: 英国
• 起止时间: 2019 至 无数据
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://gtr.ukri.org/projects?ref=105241
• 关键词: Cutting; edge; heat; pipes; improved

"Many of the most profound technological advances in modern society have been enabled by a relentless increase in the computing power of electronic devices. We have become accustomed to significant yearly advances in the functionality of these devices, along with reduction in weight, improvements in lifetime, and many other features. This technological push has brought these devices right to the physical limits of the processes on which they rely. One particular bottleneck that is becoming increasingly prominent is the thermal management of consumer electronics. Heat pipes have become the technology of choice for the thermal management of laptops, high-end cell phones, and several aerospace applications. However, this technology has not evolved sufficiently fast to keep up with the cooling requirements of modern computer chips, and, as a result, computer chips are now programmed to limit their computing power to avoid thermal damage.The core material used in current heat pipes relies on thermal sintering of copper powder, which is a slow and energy intensive process and is unable to satisfy the cooling requirements of modern electronic devices. _Microfoam_, a University of Cambridge spin-off, seeks to optimize and scale-up a disruptive new metal foam to capture a share of the rapidly growing heat pipe market. The heat pipe technology developed by _Microfoam_ is a manufacturing process that is faster, less energy intensive, allows for the fabrication of thinner heat pipes with new form factors, and, importantly, enables a step-improvement in performance of commercial devices that have not seen significant changes in four decades."

现代社会中许多最深刻的技术进步都得益于电子设备计算能力的不断提高。我们已经习惯了这些设备的功能每年都有显著的进步，同时减轻了重量，延长了寿命，以及许多其他功能。这种技术推动使这些设备达到了它们所依赖的工艺的物理极限。一个日益突出的瓶颈是消费电子产品的热管理。热管已经成为笔记本电脑、高端手机和几个航空航天应用的热管理技术的选择。然而，这项技术的发展速度还不够快，跟不上现代计算机芯片的冷却要求，因此，计算机芯片现在被编程为限制其计算能力以避免热损坏。目前热管中使用的核心材料依赖于铜粉的热烧结，这是一个缓慢且耗能的过程，无法满足现代电子设备的冷却要求。_MicroFoam是剑桥大学的一个分支，该公司寻求优化和扩大一种颠覆性的新金属泡沫，以在快速增长的热管市场中抢占份额。微泡沫公司开发的热管技术是一种更快、能耗更低的制造工艺，允许制造具有新形状系数的更薄的热管，重要的是，它能够逐步提高商业设备的性能，这些设备40年来没有发生过重大变化。