New passive cooling approach from UC San Diego uses capillary evaporation to reduce heat in computing environments
- Evaporation cooling, such as perspiration, could reduce energy consumption in data centers
- A new fiber membrane manages heat with energy consumption added to zero
- Researchers refurbish the filtration material to cool the electronics passively
As AI and Cloud Computing are developing, growing data processing demand increases heat production, cooling already representing almost 40% of the energy consumption of a data center and projected more than double in the world by 2030.
Researchers from the University of California San Diego have developed a new cooling technology that imitates the way animals regulate body temperature… by perspiration.
The passive system removes heat from electronics using evaporation, offering a potential alternative to traditional cooling methods in data centers and other high -power computer environments.
Find the “Sweet Spot”
The system nucleus is a fiber membrane with a network of tiny interconnected pores which use a capillary action to draw cooling fluid through the surface.
As the liquid evaporates, it effectively removes heat without requiring additional energy.
“Compared to the traditional air or liquid cooling, evaporation can dispel a higher heat flow while using less energy,” said Renkun Chen, professor at the Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering Department at UC San Diego. Chen co-directed the project with the teachers Shengqiang Cai and Abhishek Saha.
Research was published in the journal JouleExplaining how the Chen team, including the doctorate. The student Tianshi Feng and the postdoctoral researcher Yu Pei, tested the membrane in variable thermal conditions.
It has managed more than 800 watts per square centimeter of heat, a recording for this type of cooling system. He also worked regularly over several hours.
Traditional porous membranes have often failed due to clogging or boiling. Chen explained that the team had found an “ideal point” with the size and structure of the pores of the membrane.
“These fiber membranes were originally designed for filtration, and no one had already explored their use in evaporation,” said Chen. “We have recognized that their unique structural characteristics – interconnected pores and just the good size of pores – could make them ideal for effective evaporative cooling. What surprised us is that with the right mechanical strengthening, they not only resist the high heat flow – they behaved very well below.”
Researchers think that the membrane still works below its full potential.
They now refine the design and work on means to integrate it into cold plates, flat devices used to cool fleas like processors and GPUs.
The group is also preparing to market technology thanks to a startup. Their objective is to provide evolutionary and low energy cooling solutions while global demand for data continues to grow.
Via Tech Xplore
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