Forced Convection in Microchannels with Nanostructures on One Wall

New electronic devices are faster than ever before, incorporate a higher level of integration, and as a result, need to dissipate higher heat fluxes. Active cooling is the only possible method of thermal management for these devices. A new type of microchannel heat sink has been developed and evaluated in this study. The device consists of silicon microchannels on whose bottom surfaces multi-walled carbon nanotubes are grown. The objective of the study is to investigate the effect of carbon nanotubes on the heat transfer characteristics. The heat sink size is 15 mm by 15 mm by 0.675 mm. It contains two microchannel designs. One consists of eight channels of cross section 682 micrometers by 50 micrometers; the other has six channels of cross section 942 micrometers by 50 micrometers. The heat sink is incorporated in an open loop flow facility, with water as the coolant. Six different configurations are compared. Two have no nanotubes, two have closely spaced nanotubes, while the last two designs have widely spaced nanotubes. The tests utilize an infrared camera as well as thermocouples placed in the flow for characterization. The heat transfer characteristics are compared for the different cases.M.S.Committee Chair: Dr. Yogendra Joshi; Committee Member: Dr. Michael J. Rightley; Committee Member: Dr. William P. Kin