Article
Can segmented flow enhance heat transfer in microchannel heat sinks?
International Journal of Heat and Mass Transfer
(2010)
Abstract
Liquid cooling is an efficient way to remove heat fluxes with magnitudes up to 10,000 W/cm2. One limitation of current single-phase microchannel heat sinks is the relatively low Nusselt number, due to laminar flow. In this work, we experimentally investigate how to enhance the Nusselt number with the introduction of segmented flow. The segmented flow pattern was created by the periodic injection of air bubbles through a T-junction into water-filled channels. We designed a polycarbonate heat sink consisting of an array of seven parallel microchannels each with a square cross-section 500 μm wide. We show that segmented flow increases the Nusselt number of laminar flow by more than 100%, provided the mass velocity of the liquid is within the range 330–2000 kg/m2 s.
Keywords
- segmented flow,
- microfluidics,
- multiphase flow,
- heat transfer,
- heat sink,
- electronic cooling
Disciplines
Publication Date
September, 2010
Publisher Statement
NOTICE: this is the author’s version of a work that was accepted for publication in International Journal of Heat and Mass Transfer. Changes resulting from the publishing process, such as peer review, editing, corrections, structural formatting, and other quality control mechanisms may not be reflected in this document. Changes may have been made to this work since it was submitted for publication. A definitive version was subsequently published in International Journal of Heat and Mass Transfer, [53, 19-20, (2010)] DOI:10.1016/ j.ijheatmasstransfer.2010.04.016
Citation Information
Amy Rachel Betz and Daniel Attinger. "Can segmented flow enhance heat transfer in microchannel heat sinks?" International Journal of Heat and Mass Transfer Vol. 53 Iss. 19-20 (2010) Available at: http://works.bepress.com/daniel_attinger/11/