Multi-Zone Cold Plate for Independent Cooling of Adjacent Components
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Solution Overview
Problem
Conventional cooling methods, such as air cooling and single-zone liquid cooling, struggle to efficiently manage heat dissipation from closely spaced high-power electronic components, leading to overheating, performance degradation, or component failure.
Innovation Solution
A multi-zone cold plate design with separate cooling zones and physical barriers to prevent coolant mixing, allowing tailored cooling rates and temperatures for each component, using a single cold plate to occupy less space and improve cooling efficiency.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Volume of moving object
If a single cold plate is used to cool multiple closely spaced components, then space requirements are reduced, but cooling efficiency and temperature management deteriorate due to inability to provide tailored cooling to each component
Solution Approach 1:
The cold plate is divided into multiple independent cooling zones separated by thermal barriers. Each zone can be independently configured with its own coolant flow channels and thermal characteristics, allowing tailored cooling for different components while maintaining a compact single-plate structure.
Solution Approach 2:
Different regions of the cold plate are designed with locally optimized thermal properties, including varying coolant flow rates, channel configurations, and thermal conductivities to match the specific heat dissipation requirements of each component zone.
2Device complexity
If coolant flow is shared across multiple zones, then device complexity is reduced, but temperature control precision deteriorates due to coolant mixing and uniform cooling
Solution Approach 1:
The coolant flow paths are segmented into separate channels for each cooling zone, prevented from mixing by physical barriers integrated into the cold plate structure. This allows independent temperature control for each zone while maintaining relatively simple overall device architecture.
3Device complexity
If conventional air cooling or single-zone liquid cooling is used, then device simplicity is maintained, but heat dissipation performance deteriorates for high-power closely spaced components
Solution Approach 1:
The system transitions from air cooling to liquid cooling, utilizing the superior heat capacity and thermal conductivity of liquid coolant to dramatically improve heat dissipation performance for high-power electronic components.
Solution Approach 2:
The cold plate incorporates multiple independently controlled cooling zones with optimized coolant flow distribution, enabling efficient heat removal from multiple closely spaced high-power components simultaneously.
Applied Scientific Principles
This section explains which scientific principles are used to turn an abstract innovation direction into a practical engineering solution.
Function Achieved in This Case
The multi-zone cold plate effectively cools multiple components by independently managing heat transfer and temperature, enhancing cooling performance and preventing overheating, while reducing space requirements.
Implementation Method 1
transferred heat from a first heat-generating electronic component to a first coolant passing through a first heat-transfer core of the first cold plate, and transferred heat from a second heat-generating electronic component to a second coolant passing through a second heat-transfer core of the second cold plate
Implementation Method 2
Conventional air cooling relies on natural convection or uses forced convection (e.g., a fan mounted near a heat producing component) to replace heated air with cooler ambient air around the component
Data Source
AI summary
A multi-zone cold plate includes at least first and second adjacent cooling zones. Each cooling zone has a heat-transfer chamber partly occupied by a corresponding heat-transfer core. Each cooling zone also has a corresponding inlet passage configured to convey a respective coolant to the respective cooling zone. Each cooling zone further has a corresponding outlet passage configured to convey the respective coolant from the corresponding cooling zone. A wall positioned between the first cooling zone and the second cooling zone prevents each respective coolant from mixing with the other. Such a multi-zone cold plate can provide a unique rate of cooling and/or a unique operating temperature to each cooling zone. Each unique rate of cooling or operating temperature can be tailored to correspond to specified operating parameters of heat-generating electronic devices that are positioned close to each other.