Heat Transfer Performance of Plate Fin and Pin Fin Heat Sinks Using Al2O3/H2O Nanofluid in Electronic Cooling

The thermal management of electronic devices has become a major problem in recent years. Therefore, there is a growing need for research on many new materials and innovative fluids due to the developing technology and increasing cooling need in electronic systems. In this paper, heat transfer from a plate fin and pin fin type heat sinks that were placed in a water block that are used in electronic systems was investigated. A base fluid (pure water) and 0.1% mass concentration Al2O3-H2O nanofluid were used as cooling fluids. The experiments were carried out for volumetric flow rates varying between 100 and 800 mL/min and heat flux values of 454.54 W/m(2) and 1818.18 W/m(2). The results demonstrated that the Al2O3-H2O nanofluid on the empty surface provided a maximum improvement of 10.5% in heat transfer compared to the base fluid. In the use of plate finned heat sink, the maximum amount of improvement in heat transfer compared to the empty surface was obtained approximately 64.25% for the base fluid and 82.8% for the nanofluid. A similar comparison was made for the pin-fin heat sink, a maximum thermal improvement of 56.4% in the base fluid and 70.27% in the use of nanofluid was determined.

Automated summary

This paper investigates the heat transfer of different types of heat sinks used in electronic systems, and confirms the significant improvement provided by Al2O3-H2O nanofluid in heat dissipation.