Experimental and computational study of using nanofluid for thermal management of electronic chips

The compact equipment, area restriction for air-cooled devices, and thermal management of microchips have attracted the attention of researchers concerned with superior liquid cooling systems. During the present study, the impact of using nanofluids for cooling a chip was carried out experimentally and numerically. The experiments were conducted to validate the CFD model. Then the CFD model was applied for examining the impact of nanofluid concentration, and coolant flow rate on the thermal-hydraulic characteristics of the heat sink. Cu-Owater nanofluid was used with five different nanoparticle volume fractions of 0.5, 0.86, 1.5, 2.25, 3.5 and 5 vol.%. The developed CFD model was validated with the obtained experimental results and with results of different researchers, which showed good agreement. The results showed that for the investigated electronic chip with an area of 5 cm by 5 cm and dissipated power of 130 W, an enhancement of 8.1% in thermal conductance was noticed when using nanofluids as compared to water for the studied operating range. The overall thermal hydraulic performance of using nanofluid is found to accomplish higher value of 1.47 at nanoparticle volume fraction of 5% of CuO and Reynolds number of 800.

Automated summary

This study experimentally and numerically investigated the impact of using nanofluids for cooling a chip, showing an enhancement in thermal conductance compared to water. The optimal thermal-hydraulic performance was found with nanofluid at a nanoparticle volume fraction of 5% CuO, reaching a higher value of 1.47.