Swirl-Enhanced Microchannel Cold Plate for Boundary Layer Control
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Solution Overview
Problem
Conventional liquid cooling systems for high-power microprocessors face inefficiencies due to limited fin height and thermal boundary layer formation, leading to reduced heat absorption and susceptibility to corrosion and clogging from facility-grade cooling liquids.
Innovation Solution
A swirl-enhanced cold plate assembly with geometrically optimized protrusions and jet impingement nozzles creates high vorticity flow, disrupting thermal boundary layers and incorporating a protective coating to resist corrosion and clogging, allowing for efficient heat transfer using facility-grade liquids.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Ease of manufacture
If conventional metals are used in narrow microchannel passages, then manufacturing is easier, but heat conduction capability deteriorates
Solution Approach 1:
The patent employs copper substrate material for the cold plate body to ensure high thermal conductivity in the bulk structure, while applying diamond-like carbon (DLC) coating on the microchannel surfaces. This composite approach allows the bulk metal to provide structural integrity and overall heat conduction, while the DLC-coated surfaces enable efficient heat transfer to the coolant in the narrow passages without requiring the entire passage structure to be made of high-conductivity material.
2Temperature
If fin height is increased to improve heat dissipation, then heat transfer area increases, but fin efficiency deteriorates due to thermal boundary layer formation
Solution Approach 1:
The patent incorporates vortex generators and turbulence promoters within the microchannel passages that create controlled flow disturbances and vortices. These mechanical flow disruptions prevent the formation of stable thermal boundary layers along the fin surfaces, maintaining high heat transfer coefficients even in taller fin structures where boundary layer development would normally reduce efficiency.
Solution Approach 2:
The patent changes the flow regime parameter from laminar to turbulent flow by introducing geometric features that increase Reynolds number effects in the microchannels. This parameter change disrupts thermal boundary layer development and maintains high convective heat transfer coefficients, enabling effective heat dissipation from extended fin surfaces.
3Device complexity
If facility-grade cooling liquids are used, then system complexity is reduced, but corrosion and clogging susceptibility increases
Solution Approach 1:
The patent applies a protective diamond-like carbon (DLC) coating on the microchannel surfaces that acts as a sacrificial or highly resistant barrier layer. This coating protects the underlying metal substrate from corrosion by facility-grade cooling liquids and prevents particulate matter from adhering to and clogging the narrow passages, enabling the use of simpler, less purified coolant fluids.
Solution Approach 2:
The combination of copper substrate with DLC coating creates a composite structure where the DLC layer provides chemical inertness and anti-fouling properties when exposed to facility-grade cooling liquids, while the copper substrate maintains thermal conductivity. This material composite enables reliable operation with simpler coolant fluids.
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
Enhances heat transfer efficiency and resistance to corrosion, enabling reliable cooling with facility-grade liquids in a single cooling loop, reducing the need for secondary coolant systems.
Implementation Method 1
The swirl enhancement protrusions induce swirl or turbulence to cooling liquid flow between the adjacent extended fins
Implementation Method 2
The swirl or turbulence induced in the cooling liquid flow disrupts a thermal boundary layer of the cooling liquid flow
Implementation Method 3
Cold plates are a type of heatsink that allows for a cooling liquid to be brought into thermal conduction contact with the heat generating electronic components
Implementation Method 4
incorporating a protective coating to resist corrosion and clogging
Data Source
AI summary
A cold plate assembly includes a cold plate manufactured from a thermally conductive material and having a first surface attachable to a heat generating electronic component and a second surface opposite to the first surface, the second surface having an array of extended fins. A swirl enhancement plate of the cold plate assembly is positioned proximate and parallel to the second surface, having at least one nozzle opening to channel one or more corresponding impingement jets of cooling liquid toward the second surface, and having a plurality of swirl enhancement protrusions each extending toward the second surface in a corresponding microchannel between two adjacent extended fins to induce swirl/turbulence that disrupts a thermal boundary layer of the cooling liquid flow. An encapsulating lid attachable to the second surface forms a liquid cooling cavity encompassing the array of extended fins and swirl enhancement plate and includes intake and exhaust ports.