Thermal Characterization of Micro-Channels Heat Exchanger for High-End Processors

With the market demand of more performance at smaller form factors, the technology direction is moving into increasing the transistors in semiconductor devices by a significant percentage, which translates into increasing the heat flux by a substantial amount. Thermal management of these devices, within a compact form factors, at an acceptable junction temperature, is a challenging task for the industry and researchers alike. This paper presents the significant increase in cooling capacity by using micro-channels technology in liquid cooling and highlights the advantages of this solution over macro-channels. The current study has examined the effects of both the channel width and its wall thickness on the heat transfer coefficient and hydraulic impedance. The present investigation is supported by CFD simulations and experimental results. The preliminary results of this study show that micro-channels technology could improve the heat exchanger performance by 64%. Finally, this paper proposes an empirical model to account for the effects of the geometric parameters of the heat exchanger on its thermal performance, as well as, its hydraulic characteristic.