Systems for immersion cooling tank controller communication

Abstract

An immersion cooling system has one or more baseboard management controllers (BMCs) disposed within an immersion cooling container. The immersion cooling container is fluidically isolated from an environment external to the immersion cooling container. An external controller is communicatively coupled to the one or more BMCs through a BMC interface disposed on the immersion cooling container. The BMC interface provides a communicative coupling to the one or more BMCs while fluidically decoupling an interior of the immersion cooling container from the environment external to the immersion cooling container.

Description

SYSTEMS FOR IMMERSION COOLING TANK CONTROLLER COMMUNICATIONCROSS-REFERENCE TO RELATED APPLICATION

[0001] This Application claims the benefit of provisional U.S. Application No. 63 / 618,651, filed on January 8, 2024, and entitled “SYSTEMS FOR IMMERSION COOLING TANK CONTROLLER COMMUNICATION” which is hereby incorporated by reference in its entirety.

[0002] In cases where the present application conflicts with a document incorporated by reference, the present application controls.BACKGROUND

[0003] As feature sizes and transistor sizes have decreased for integrated circuits (ICs) including chips and semiconductor dies, the amount of heat generated by a single IC, such as a microprocessor, has increased. Computing hardware that has traditionally been air cooled have evolved to ICs needing more heat dissipation than can be provided by air alone. In some cases, immersion cooling of ICs in a tank containing a coolant liquid is employed to maintain ICs at appropriate operating temperatures. These tanks and ICs may function as cloud computing systems that provide high-power computation on demand for processes like artificial intelligence (Al) training and inference.

[0004] One type of immersion cooling is two-phase immersion cooling, in which heat from a semiconductor die is high enough to boil the coolant liquid. The boiling creates a coolant-liquid vapor in the tank, which is condensed by cooling coils back to liquid form. Heat from the semiconductor dies can then be sunk into the liquid-to-gas and gas-to-liquid phase transitions of the coolant liquid.

[0005] These computing systems may use hardware components from a variety of manufacturers, each of which may be managed using a baseboard management controller (BMC). Accessing a BMC inside of an immersion cooling tank during operation may present unique challenges that do not have readily available solutions in the present state of the art.SUMMARY

[0006] Baseboard management controllers (BMCs) provide valuable management functionality for a variety of components in computing systems, including distributed computing systems such as immersion cooling systems. However, immersion cooling systems operated in a sealed environment to prevent contamination and leakage of the immersion cooling fluid may also prevent readily available access and communications with enclosed computing hardware.

[0007] The present technology is directed to methods and systems for communicating with one or more BMCs through the use of specialized passthroughs that may utilize the inter-integrated circuit (I2C) communication protocol. In an aspect, an I2C interface may provide telemetry and / or diagnostic access to one or more BMCs, even when one or more primary networks are unavailable or not functioning. Furthermore, an I2C interface in accordance with the present technology may provide access to one or more server and / or immersion cooling system BMCs without providing access to sensitive data stored on or transferred to / from the server, such as customer data.

[0008] In some aspects, the techniques described herein relate to an immersion cooling system, the system including an immersion cooling container containing an immersion cooling fluid; at least one server disposed within the immersion cooling fluid, the at least one server including a baseboard management controller (BMC) configured to manage an operation of the at least one server; a BMC interface configured to communicatively couple the BMC to a component external to the immersion cooling container while fluidically decoupling an interior of the immersion cooling container and an environment external to the immersion cooling container; and a controller disposed externally to the immersion cooling container and communicatively coupled to the BMC through the BMC interface.

[0009] In some aspects, the techniques described herein relate to a system, wherein the BMC controls an operation of the at least one server or a component associated with the immersion cooling container.

[0010] In some aspects, the techniques described herein relate to a system, wherein the operation includes a voltage, a current, a resistance, a capacitance, a temperature, a flow rate, a frequency, a power, a storage of energy, an operation of a battery, throttling asemiconductor die in the at least one server, rate limiting the semiconductor die, or depowering the semiconductor die.

[0011] In some aspects, the techniques described herein relate to a system, wherein the BMC interface includes an inter-integrated circuit (I2C) interface.

[0012] All combinations of the foregoing concepts and additional concepts discussed in greater detail below (provided such concepts are not mutually inconsistent) are part of the inventive subject matter disclosed herein. In particular, all combinations of claimed subject matter appearing at the end of this disclosure are part of the inventive subject matter disclosed herein. The terminology used herein that also may appear in any disclosure incorporated by reference should be accorded a meaning most consistent with the particular concepts disclosed herein.BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS

[0013] The skilled artisan will understand that the drawings primarily are for illustrative purposes and are not intended to limit the scope of the inventive subject matter described herein. The drawings are not necessarily to scale; in some instances, various aspects of the inventive subject matter disclosed herein may be shown exaggerated or enlarged in the drawings to facilitate an understanding of different features. In the drawings, like reference characters generally refer to like features (e.g., functionally similar and / or structurally similar elements).

[0014] FIG. 1 depicts an immersion cooling system including an BMC interface communicatively coupling an external controller to a baseboard management controller disposed within immersion cooling system.

[0015] FIG. 2 depicts aspects of an immersion cooling system for dissipating heat from one or more heat-generating components such as semiconductor die packages via immersion cooling.DETAILED DESCRIPTION

[0016] FIG. 1 depicts an immersion cooling system 100 including an BMC interface 122 communicatively coupling an external controller to a baseboard management controller disposed within immersion cooling system 100. Immersion cooling system 100 may be adistributed computing platform that provides computation for one or more remote entities. Immersion cooling system 100 may include an immersion cooling container 110 containing immersion cooling fluid 112. Immersion cooling fluid 112 may occupy multiple phases during operation including liquid, foam, and vapor phases.

[0017] Immersion cooling system 100 may be a two-phase immersion cooling system in which immersion cooling liquid absorbs heat from one or more ICs, semiconductor dies, or other computing hardware and boils. The boiled immersion cooling vapor then rises out of the immersion cooling liquid, carrying the waste heat to condenser coils or pipes (shown in reference to FIG. 2). The condenser coils transfer heat from the immersion cooling vapor and cause the immersion cooling vapor to recondense.

[0018] Immersion cooling system 100 may include servers 130a-j, which are communicatively coupled to tank BMC 120. The one or more servers may include one or more computing hardware elements such as an IC, system-on-a-chip (SoC), central processing units (CPU), graphics processing units (GPU), tensor processing unit (TPU), data processing unit (DPU), voltage regulator (VR), high bandwidth memory (HBM), digital signal processor (DSP), an artificial intelligence (Al) accelerator, an applicationspecific integrated circuit (ASIC), field-programmable gate array (FPGA), and / or other densely patterned semiconductor die.

[0019] Any, some, or all of servers 130a-j may additionally or alternatively include one or more memory modules. A memory module may be an IC configured to store data and may include a dynamic random access memory (DRAM) module, a static random access memory (SRAM) module, a flash memory module, a solid-state drive (SSD), a nonvolatile random access memory (NVRAM) module, a read-only memory (ROM) module (such as a floating-gate ROM, erasable programmable read-only memory (EPROM), electrically erasable programmable read-only memory (EEPROM), one-time programmable ROM (OTPROM), or the like), or any suitable type of memory module.

[0020] Servers 130a-j may be distributed computing servers configured to perform distributed computing tasks such as Al model training, Al inference, video and / or graphics processing, and the like. In an embodiment, each server of servers 130a-j may include a plurality of computing hardware, such as eight GPUs, two head node CPUs, integrated DRAM memory modules, three-dimensional integrated circuit (3DIC) stacks, printed circuit boards (PCBs), voltage regulators, sensors, network interface cards (NICs), one ormore BMCs, or any suitable combination of components. Each of servers 13Oa-j may include one or more server BMCs 132a-j configured to manage one or more operations of a respective server in which the server BMC is disposed. One or more operations of a respective server that may be managed by a server BMC may include throttling, rate limiting, or depowering semiconductor dies, controlling a voltage, a current, a resistance, a capacitance, a temperature, a flow rate, a frequency, a power, a storage of energy, an operation of a battery, or any suitable operation.

[0021] Tank BMC 120 may be responsible for controlling one or more physical parameters or functions of immersion cooling system 100. Tank BMC 120 may be a “tank manager” controller configured to control operations of the tank or components associated with or inside immersion cooling container 110 such as condenser coil flow rate, immersion cooling filter flow rate, servers 130 and / or semiconductor dies within servers 130 (e.g., semiconductor dies 250 in FIG. 2) including throttling, rate limiting, or depowering semiconductor dies within an immersion cooling system, ventilation systems, cooling fans, tank power, and the like.

[0022] Tank BMC 120 may include a tank manager configured to control immersion cooling system 100 based on communications with an external controller 124, which may be a distributed control plane monitoring tank BMC 120 and programmed to determine one or more actions to take in response to inputs from the tank BMC 120, such as powering down immersion cooling system 100 or issuing a notification to a human operator in the event of a malfunction. Tank BMC 120 and / or server BMCs 132a-j may be able to checkpoint or save data on immersed computing hardware or adjust, throttle, pause, and / or control processes (e.g., Al model training) running on the immersed computing hardware.

[0023] Tank BMC 120 and / or server BMCs 132a-j may be communicatively coupled with BMC interface 122, which may provide a communicative pathway for one or more BMCs 120 and / or server BMCs 132a-j to one or more external components such as external controller 124. In an embodiment, BMC interface 122 may be an inter-integrated circuit (I2C or I2C) interface. I2C is a two-wire serial communication protocol using a serial data line (SDA) and a serial clock line (SCL). The I2C protocol supports multiple target devices on a communication bus and can also support multiple controllers that send and receive commands and data. BMC interface 122 may include a passthrough to provide acommunicative coupling between tank BMC 120 and / or server BMCs 132a-j to one or more components external to immersion cooling container 110 while preventing fluidic communication between (i.e., fluidically decoupling) an interior of immersion cooling container 110 and an exterior environment. I2C has an advantage of being able to communicate with and / or control a plurality of devices using only two wires.

[0024] In an embodiment, a BMC used in accordance with the present technology may be a remote management server processor such as an AST2600 BMC manufactured by ASPEED©. A BMC may include one or more processors, one or more memory modules such as DRAM memory modules, and one or more communications interfaces or busses (e.g., peripheral interconnect express (PCIe), I2C, ethernet, optical, universal asynchronous receiver / transmitted (UART), pulse- width modulation (PWM), or the like).

[0025] BMC interface 122 may allow external controller 124 to identify, communicate with, send and receive telemetry and / or diagnostic information to / from, update the firmware of, and control the status of one or more of servers 130a-j or server BMCs 132a- j. For example, external controller 124 may be a control plane configured to manage a power level of a computing facility and may command one or more BMCs in immersion cooling system 100 to increase or decrease a power level of one or more components of immersion cooling system 100 in response to an input such as a computing facility power level, temperature, cooling water flow rate, fire alarm, seismic disruption, or the like. BMC interface 122 may provide direct register access to one or more memory registers included in one or more BMCs including tank BMC 120 and / or server BMCs 132a-j.

[0026] The I2C protocol may have a plurality of standardized maximum data transfer speeds. For example, a maximum transfer speed in a “standard mode” may be about 100 kilobits per second (kbps); a maximum transfer speed in the “full speed” mode may be about 400 kbps; a maximum transfer speed in the “fast mode” may be about 1 megabit per second (Mbps), and a maximum transfer speed in the “high-speed mode” may be about 3.2-3.4 Mbps.

[0027] In an embodiment, an external controller 124 may be a tablet, a laptop, a scanner, a programmable logic controller (PLC), a smartphone, a handheld computing device, or any suitable device that may allow a person or entity to communicate with, retrieve information from, or send information to a BMC. This may allow on-site troubleshooting, particularly if a principal communication route such as an in-band network, a fiber opticpath, an optical network, etc., is unavailable. This can allow a “brute force” approach to fixing potential issues with BMCs during partial equipment outages, and can enable secure access to an entity such as an on-site technician via operating system permissions specific to an I2C connection with a BMC. This secure access may allow troubleshooting, firmware updates, system fixes, and the like, without a risk of compromising data security on the server (such as customer data) that may accompany using in-band networks or similar communicative connections.

[0028] FIG. 2 depicts aspects of an immersion cooling system 200 for dissipating heat from one or more heat-generating components such as semiconductor die packages 205 via immersion cooling. Each package 205 can include one or more semiconductor dies that produce heat when the system is in operation. The immersion cooling system 200 in the illustrated example of FIG. 2 is a two-phase immersion cooling system, though the invention may also be implemented in a single-phase immersion cooling system. One or more semiconductor die packages 205 may be 3DIC stacks in accordance with the present technology. For example, one or more semiconductor die packages 205 may include a logic IC and at least one memory module bonded together using a hybrid bond or microbump bond.

[0029] Immersion cooling systems may provide particular advantage to 3DIC stacks due to the lower surface area to volume ratio of a 3DIC stack compared to the individual components of the 3DIC stack (e.g., a bonded logic IC and memory module will have a lower surface area to volume ratio than the combined logic IC and memory module when physically separated) as well as the additional heat generated by state of the art logic ICs. This lower surface area to volume ratio means waste heat generated by the 3DIC stack may not be as efficiently dissipated and may require better cooling performance than air cooling can provide. Two-phase immersion cooling in particular can provide this additional heat removal required by 3DIC stacks.

[0030] Immersion cooling system 200 includes a container such as tank 220 filled, at least in part, with immersion cooling liquid 264. The immersion cooling system 200 can further include at least one chiller 280 that flows a heat-transfer fluid through at least one condenser coil 270 that is disposed in the tank 220 and headspace 208. Condenser coil 270 and chiller 280 may be part of a heat exchanger. The packages 205 can be mounted on one or more printed circuit boards (PCBs) 257 that are immersed, at least in part, in theimmersion cooling liquid 264. Immersion-cooling system 200 may further include a filter 275 disposed adjacent to the tank 220.

[0031] Filter 275 may include a filtration media, a housing, and a pump configured to force immersion cooling liquid 264 through filter 275 to remove contaminants, particulates, or other impurities that may be added to immersion cooling liquid 264 during use. Filter 275 may be housed outside of tank 220 while being in fluidic communication with immersion cooling liquid 264 in tank 220. Alternatively, filter 275 may be submerged within immersion cooling liquid 264 inside of tank 220.

[0032] Immersion cooling liquid 264 may be a hydrocarbon, a fluoroketone, an oil, or a similar dielectric liquid that will act as an insulator while simultaneously transferring heat from package 205 more efficiently than air. An example of immersion cooling liquid 264 is Novec™ 649 produced by 3M™. An exemplary immersion cooling liquid 264 used in accordance with embodiments of the present invention may have a dielectric constant baseline value of about 1.8-2 at a frequency of about 1 kHz.

[0033] In an embodiment of the invention, immersion cooling liquid 264 may be considered unacceptably contaminated if the dielectric constant and / or dielectric loss tangent of immersion cooling fluid being used in an immersion cooling system 200 differs by a threshold amount as compared to unused or pure immersion cooling liquid 264. For example, immersion cooling liquid 264 may be considered unacceptably contaminated or degraded if the dielectric constant and / or dielectric loss tangent differs by a threshold of 10% or more as compared to unused or pure immersion cooling liquid 264. In an embodiment, a dielectric constant and / or dielectric loss tangent variation threshold may be 20%, 15%, 5%, 3%, 1%, or any suitable threshold.

[0034] Contamination of the immersion cooling liquid 264 and resulting changes to dielectric constant and / or dielectric loss tangent may alter or negatively impact operation of components within immersion cooling liquid 264 including semiconductor die(s) 250. An altered dielectric constant and / or dielectric loss tangent may result in undesirable cross-talk between components on a PCB, additional noise or reduction in signal strength transmitted along exposed wires of a PCB or semiconductor die(s) 250 submerged in immersion fluid, and / or signal dissipation through the immersion cooling liquid 264. Signal loss may be severe enough that two elements may be effectively represented as being separated by an open circuit despite being physically connected. In an embodiment,a dielectric constant and / or dielectric loss tangent variation threshold may be selected based on an observed or inferred effect on one or more submerged semiconductor die(s) 250. For example, an increase in PCIe bit error rate above an error rate baseline may be correlated with an increase in dielectric constant and / or dielectric loss tangent above a dielectric constant and / or dielectric loss tangent baseline. Accordingly, operation of semiconductor die(s) 250 may be throttled or suspended when a dielectric constant and / or dielectric loss tangent of immersion cooling liquid 264 exceeds a predetermined threshold.

[0035] Changes to dielectric constant and / or dielectric loss tangent may be caused by contaminants within immersion cooling liquid 264. In some cases, changes to dielectric constant and / or dielectric loss tangent may be reversed by filtering the contaminants from immersion cooling liquid 264. In some embodiments, upon detecting an increase in dielectric constant and / or dielectric loss tangent of immersion cooling liquid 264, controller 202 may instruct filter 275 to increase filtration throughput or notify a user that an immersion cooling liquid 264 filtration media may need to be replaced. If a dielectric constant and / or dielectric loss tangent exceeds a predetermined threshold, controller 202 may throttle or shut down one or more semiconductor die(s) 250, generate a notification that immersion cooling liquid 264 should be replaced, trigger an alarm, etc.

[0036] The illustrated example of FIG. 2 is not intended to be to scale. The immersion cooling system 200 may house and provide immersion cooling liquid 264 to tens, hundreds, or even thousands of packages 205. In some cases, the immersion cooling system 200 can be small (e.g., the size of a floor unit air conditioner, approximately 1 meter high, 0.5 meter width, 0.5 meter depth or length). In some implementations, the immersion cooling system can be large (e.g., the size of a van or larger, approximately 2.5 meters high, 2.5 meters width, 4 meters depth or length).

[0037] The immersion cooling system 200 can also include a controller 202 (e.g., a microcontroller, programmable logic controller (PLC), microprocessor, field- programmable gate array, logic circuitry, memory, or some combination thereof) to manage system operation. Controller 202 can perform various system functions such as monitoring temperatures of system components, cooling fluid level, tank access, chiller operation etc. The controller 202 can further issue commands to control system operation such as executing a start-up sequence, executing a shut-down sequence, assigning workloads among the packages, changing cooling fluid level, changing the temperature ofthe heat-transfer fluid circulated by the chiller 280, etc. In some implementations, controller 202 can include (or itself be) a baseboard management controller (BMC) 204. That is, the BMC 204 may monitor and control all aspects of system operation for the immersion cooling system 200 in addition to monitoring and controlling workloads of the semiconductor dies 250 in the packages 205 cooled by the system. The immersion cooling system 200 can also include a network interface controller (NIC 203) to allow the system to communicate over a network, such as a local area network or wide area network. The immersion cooling system 200 can further include a fluid sensor array 290 having a plurality of fluid sensors 210. Fluid sensors 210 may include one or more leak detection sensors at least partially submerged in immersion cooling liquid 264.

[0038] The semiconductor die(s) 250 and can be mounted on and attached to a printed circuit board (PCB) 255 (sometimes referred to as a substrate) in device package 205. The package 205 can be made commercially available as an off-the-shelf (OTS) product. The package 205 can be used for single-phase or two-phase immersion cooling of at least one semiconductor die 250, such as a microprocessor (e.g., a central processing unit (CPU) and / or graphics processing unit (GPU)), voltage regulator (VR), high bandwidth memory (HBM), a digital signal processing (DSP) die, an artificial intelligence (Al) accelerator, an application-specific integrated circuit (ASIC), field-programmable gate array (FPGA), and / or other densely patterned semiconductor die.

[0039] In the two-phase immersion cooling system 200 of FIG. 2, heat flows from the semiconductor die 250 where it is generated into the heat spreader 252. The heat spreader 252 is in thermal contact with an immersion cooling liquid 264 that can flow over and extract heat from the heat spreader 252. The amount of heat delivered by the heat spreader 252 to the immersion cooling liquid 264 is enough to boil the immersion cooling liquid 264 that contacts the heat spreader 252 (creating bubbles 265 and potentially creating froth 267 when bubbles 265 reach the surface of immersion cooling liquid 264). The vapor 266 from the boiled immersion cooling liquid 264 can be cooled and condensed back to liquid droplets 268, for example, by the condenser coil 270. The heat-transfer fluid, such as chilled water, from the chiller 280 can be circulated through the condenser coil 270 to lower the temperature of the condenser coil 270 below the condensation point in the headspace 208 of the tank 220. As a result, vapor 266 condenses on exterior surfaces of the condenser coil 270 and liquid droplets 268 from the condensed vapor can drip and / orflow back to the immersion cooling liquid 264. Although a single condenser coil 270 is depicted in FIG. 2, there can be a plurality of condenser coils 270 in tank 220 to condense the vapor 266 into droplets. Some or all of the condenser coils 270 may or may not be located directly over the PCBs 257. Instead, the condenser coil(s) 270 can be located near one or more walls of the tank 220, such that the condenser coil(s) 270 are not directly over the PCBs 257 on which the packages 205 are mounted.

[0040] To improve thermal performance in two-phase immersion cooling system 200, the heat spreader 252 can include a boiling enhancement coating (BEC) on at least one surface. The BEC can be formed from copper or a copper alloy and can be porous, for example, though BECs can take various forms. In some cases, the BEC is a micro porous copper coating having a thickness from approximately or exactly 50 microns to 500 microns thick (which may be produced by electroplating and / or etching). In some implementations, the BEC comprises a mesh copper layer bonded (e.g., via resistance heating) to at least an outer surface of the heat spreader 252. In some cases, the BEC is applied as particulates to at least one smooth surface of the heat spreader 252 and then subsequently sintered to adhere to one another and to the heat spreader 252. The BEC provides an improved surface area to contact the immersion cooling liquid 264 and can increase the heat transfer coefficient from the heat spreader 252 to the immersion cooling liquid 264 by up to a factor of 15 versus a smooth surface on the heat spreader 252. Accordingly, BECs can increase thermal conductivity to, and accelerate the boiling of, the immersion cooling liquid 264.

[0041] Further implementations of boiling enhancement coatings and enclosures are possible. Additional arrangements, applications, and methods of use of boiling enhancement coatings and enclosures, including with semiconductor dies and 3DIC stacks, are described in the below U.S. Patent Applications.

[0042] U.S. Patent Application No. 18 / 327,615, filed June 1, 2023 and entitled "Boiler Enhancement Coatings with Active Boiling Management,” discloses heat spreader and boiling enhancement enclosure architectures thermally and / or mechanically coupled to one or more semiconductor dies or logic ICs that may be used for passive and / or active management of immersion cooling fluid boiling, including through the use of valves to control pressure of boiling immersion cooling fluid within a boiling enhancementchamber, particularly in paragraphs

[0018] -

[0039] and FIGS. 3-5B. The entirety of U.S. Patent Application No. 18 / 327,615 is incorporated herein by reference.

[0043] U.S. Provisional Patent Application No. 63 / 500,167, filed May 4, 2023 and entitled “Direct to Chip Heat Spreader and Boiler Enhancement Coatings for Microelectronics,” discloses heat spreader and BECs thermally and / or mechanically coupled to one or more semiconductor dies, logic ICs, and / or 3DIC stacks, particularly in paragraphs

[0015] -

[0033] and FIGS. 2A-4. BEC form factors may include graphite heat spreader architectures, vapor chambers, heat pipes, copper plates, fins, and the like. BEC form factors may be thermally and / or mechanically coupled to the one or more semiconductor dies, logic ICs, and / or 3DIC stacks through a thermally conductive epoxy, and may have varying dimensions relative to a surface to which the semiconductor dies and / or logic ICs are mounted. The entirety of U.S. Provisional Patent Application No. 63 / 500,167 is incorporated herein by reference.

[0044] U.S. Patent Application No. 18 / 460,091, filed September 1, 2023 and entitled “Direct to Chip Application of Boiling Enhancement Coating,” discloses BECs and methods for applying BECs to semiconductor dies, logic ICs, and / or 3DIC stacks in accordance with the present technology. In particular, paragraphs

[0024] -

[0046] and FIGS. 2A-5 disclose embodiments of BEC layers, adhesives, solders, sintering, laser ablation, meshes, and other BECs and BEC application methods. The entirety of U.S. Patent Application No. 18 / 460,091 is incorporated herein by reference.

[0045] U.S. Provisional Patent Application No. 63 / 506,945, filed June 8, 2023 and entitled “Vapor- Shedding Structures for Boiler Plates in Two-Phase Immersion Cooling Systems,” discloses structures that may be thermally and / or mechanically coupled to computing hardware such as one or more semiconductor dies, logic ICs, and / or 3DIC stacks to enable the shedding of immersion cooling vapors generated from the boiling of immersion cooling fluid during operation of the computing hardware. In particular, paragraphs

[0021] -

[0039] and FIGS. 3A-5 disclose vapor-shedding structures including varying porosities, constituent materials, and geometries relative to the computing hardware on which they are mounted. The entirety of U.S. Provisional Patent Application No. 63 / 506,945 is incorporated herein by reference.

[0046] U.S. Provisional Application No. 63 / 513,828, filed July 14, 2023 and entitled “Grinding Apparatuses and Methods for Mechanically Modifying Surfaces of Processorsto Promote Boiling of a Coolant Liquid,” discloses methods for creating boiling enhancement modifications to surfaces such as the surfaces of computing hardware such as one or more semiconductor dies, logic ICs, and / or 3DIC stacks, particularly in paragraphs

[0036] -

[0095] and FIGS. 2A-8. For example, grooves, patterns, gouges, trenches, or other structures may be added to a surface or lid of a processor, semiconductor die, logic IC, 3DIC stack component, and / or BEC to encourage nucleation sites for bubbles of immersion cooling vapor to form during a cooling process, thus decreasing the thermal resistance between the processor, semiconductor die, logic IC, and / or 3DIC stack component and the surrounding immersion cooling fluid. The entirety of U.S. Provisional Application No. 63 / 513,828 is incorporated herein by reference.

[0047] U.S. Provisional Patent Application No. 63 / 513,829, filed July 14, 2023 and entitled “Electrical Connector Having a Heater to Facilitate Boiling of a Coolant Liquid to Improve Signal Integrity in Immersion Cooling Environment,” discloses heaters for promoting boiling of immersion cooling fluid near electrical connectors such as connections between components of a 3DIC stack and enable improved impedances at those connectors, particularly in paragraphs

[0019] -

[0052] and FIGS. 1A-3B. The entirety of U.S. Provisional Patent Application No. 63 / 513,829 is incorporated herein by reference.

[0048] U.S. Provisional Patent Application No. 63 / 603,242, filed November 28, 2023 and entitled “Woven Boiler Enhancement Coatings,” provides additional examples of BECs including woven BECs with variable weave patterns, densities, attachment mechanisms, and materials (including copper and tungsten) that may be attached to computing hardware such as one or more semiconductor dies, logic ICs, and / or 3DIC stacks in order to promote more efficient heat transfer and immersion cooling vapor nucleation, particularly in paragraphs

[0031] -

[0055] and FIGS. 3-7. The entirety of U.S. Provisional Patent Application No. 63 / 603,242 is incorporated herein by reference.CONCLUSION

[0049] While various inventive embodiments have been described and illustrated herein, those of ordinary skill in the art will readily envision a variety of other means and / or structures for performing the function and / or obtaining the results and / or one or more of the advantages described herein, and each of such variations and / or modifications is deemed to be within the scope of the inventive embodiments described herein. Moregenerally, those skilled in the art will readily appreciate that all parameters, dimensions, materials, and configurations described herein are meant to be exemplary and that the actual parameters, dimensions, materials, and / or configurations will depend upon the specific application or applications for which the inventive teachings is / are used. Those skilled in the art will recognize, or be able to ascertain using no more than routine experimentation, many equivalents to the specific inventive embodiments described herein. It is, therefore, to be understood that the foregoing embodiments are presented by way of example only and that, within the scope of the appended claims and equivalents thereto, inventive embodiments may be practiced otherwise than as specifically described and claimed. Inventive embodiments of the present disclosure are directed to each individual feature, system, article, material, kit, and / or method described herein. In addition, any combination of two or more such features, systems, articles, materials, kits, and / or methods, if such features, systems, articles, materials, kits, and / or methods are not mutually inconsistent, is included within the inventive scope of the present disclosure.

[0050] Also, various inventive concepts may be embodied as one or more methods, of which an example has been provided. The acts performed as part of the method may be ordered in any suitable way. Accordingly, embodiments may be constructed in which acts are performed in an order different than illustrated, which may include performing some acts simultaneously, even though shown as sequential acts in illustrative embodiments.

[0051] All definitions, as defined and used herein, should be understood to control over dictionary definitions, definitions in documents incorporated by reference, and / or ordinary meanings of the defined terms.

[0052] The indefinite articles “a” and “an,” as used herein in the specification and in the claims, unless clearly indicated to the contrary, should be understood to mean “at least one.”

[0053] The phrase “and / or,” as used herein in the specification and in the claims, should be understood to mean “either or both” of the elements so conjoined, i.e., elements that are conjunctively present in some cases and disjunctively present in other cases. Multiple elements listed with “and / or” should be construed in the same fashion, i.e., “one or more” of the elements so conjoined. Other elements may optionally be present other than the elements specifically identified by the “and / or” clause, whether related or unrelated to those elements specifically identified. Thus, as a non-limiting example, a reference to “Aand / or B”, when used in conjunction with open-ended language such as “comprising” can refer, in one embodiment, to A only (optionally including elements other than B); in another embodiment, to B only (optionally including elements other than A); in yet another embodiment, to both A and B (optionally including other elements); etc.

[0054] As used herein in the specification and in the claims, “or” should be understood to have the same meaning as “and / or” as defined above. For example, when separating items in a list, “or” or “and / or” shall be interpreted as being inclusive, i.e., the inclusion of at least one, but also including more than one, of a number or list of elements, and, optionally, additional unlisted items. Only terms clearly indicated to the contrary, such as “only one of’ or “exactly one of,” or, when used in the claims, “consisting of,” will refer to the inclusion of exactly one element of a number or list of elements. In general, the term “or” as used herein shall only be interpreted as indicating exclusive alternatives (i.e., “one or the other but not both”) when preceded by terms of exclusivity, such as “either,” “one of,” “only one of,” or “exactly one of.” “Consisting essentially of,” when used in the claims, shall have its ordinary meaning as used in the field of patent law.

[0055] As used herein in the specification and in the claims, the phrase “at least one,” in reference to a list of one or more elements, should be understood to mean at least one element selected from any one or more of the elements in the list of elements, but not necessarily including at least one of each and every element specifically listed within the list of elements and not excluding any combinations of elements in the list of elements. This definition also allows that elements may optionally be present other than the elements specifically identified within the list of elements to which the phrase “at least one” refers, whether related or unrelated to those elements specifically identified. Thus, as a nonlimiting example, “at least one of A and B” (or, equivalently, “at least one of A or B,” or, equivalently “at least one of A and / or B”) can refer, in one embodiment, to at least one, optionally including more than one, A, with no B present (and optionally including elements other than B); in another embodiment, to at least one, optionally including more than one, B, with no A present (and optionally including elements other than A); in yet another embodiment, to at least one, optionally including more than one, A, and at least one, optionally including more than one, B (and optionally including other elements); etc.

[0056] In the claims, as well as in the specification above, all transitional phrases such as “comprising,” “including,” “carrying,” “having,” “containing,” “involving,” “holding,”“composed of,” and the like are to be understood to be open-ended, i.e., to mean including but not limited to. Only the transitional phrases “consisting of’ and “consisting essentially of’ shall be closed or semi-closed transitional phrases, respectively, as set forth in the United States Patent Office Manual of Patent Examining Procedures, Section 2111.03.

Claims

CLAIMS1. An immersion cooling system, the system comprising: an immersion cooling container containing an immersion cooling fluid; at least one server disposed within the immersion cooling fluid, the at least one server comprising a baseboard management controller (BMC) configured to manage an operation of the at least one server; a BMC interface configured to communicatively couple the BMC to a component external to the immersion cooling container while fluidically decoupling an interior of the immersion cooling container and an environment external to the immersion cooling container; and a controller disposed externally to the immersion cooling container and communicatively coupled to the BMC through the BMC interface.

2. The system of claim 1, wherein the BMC controls an operation of the at least one server or a component associated with the immersion cooling container.

3. The system of claim 2, wherein the operation comprises a voltage, a current, a resistance, a capacitance, a temperature, a flow rate, a frequency, a power, a storage of energy, an operation of a battery, throttling a semiconductor die in the at least one server, rate limiting the semiconductor die, or depowering the semiconductor die.

4. The system of claim 1, wherein the BMC interface comprises an inter-integrated circuit (I2C) interface.

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