Product category:
Heatsinks and Thermal Management
News Release from: Cambridge Consultants | Subject: Evaporative cooler
Edited by the Electronicstalk Editorial
Team on 10 December 2004
Evaporation is easy answer to fuel-cell
cooling
Cambridge Consultants has developed a novel "evaporative cooler" concept design for cooling the fuel cell powered laptop computers of the future.
Cambridge Consultants has developed a novel "evaporative cooler" concept design for cooling the fuel cell powered laptop computers of the future Although fuel cells offer many potential benefits to the user and the environment they produce clean water as a byproduct, which must be managed or contained
This article was originally published on Electronicstalk on 5 Nov 2002 at 8.00am (UK)
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In addition the powerful microchips used in laptops also emit a substantial amount of heat, which is difficult to dissipate in compact product arrangements.
Cambridge Consultants has developed and tested a design that takes its inspiration from plant-life and uses evaporation to cool the processor, reduce package space and improve the user experience.
A 2004 study titled "Micro fuel cells" from leading analyst ABI Research estimates that the mass market acceptance of fuel cells in portable electronic devices will be in 2008, at the earliest.
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According to Atakan Ozbek, ABI Research's Director of Energy Research, the market for fuel cell powered laptops will grow rapidly between 2008 and 2011, growing to a predicted 120 million laptops and a market worth $1.2 billion.
To reach these high growth projections it is essential that the manufacturers of portable devices and the developers of fuel cells improve the convenience of using fuel cell powered products and thereby speed market acceptance of this new technology.
The "evaporative cooler" concept from Cambridge Consultants takes its inspiration from plants, which use microscopic openings called stomata to evaporate water, providing a capillary force for the distribution of nutrients and cooling the leaf surface.
The concept developed by Cambridge Consultants is designed around a modular arrangement of aluminium fins with etched microchannels.
The microchannels enable heat takeup and efficient fluid transfer to the evaporation surface, and the thermal properties of aluminium provide a highly conductive link between the electronic process requiring cooling and the evaporation surface, where heat is dissipated.
The evaporation surface uses a porous mesh membrane, ensuring the even distribution of water and a large surface area for evaporation.
Johannes Hartick, Head of Cambridge Consultants' Energy Systems Group explains the benefits behind the evaporative cooler concept: "As the processors in portable computers get more and more advanced they require more power and as a result they dissipate excessive heat".
"If fuel cells are going to reach their potential it is essential that we overcome obstacles to the adoption of this technology at an early stage".
He added, "In testing we see that our evaporative cooler dissipated three times the amount of heat when compared to air cooling alone".
"This provides device manufacturers with many options when it comes to the cooling system, including the opportunity to reduce its overall size and impact on the end user, or provide space for increased features".
During in-house tests the surface temperature of the evaporative cooler was compared with a conventional air cooler.
The stabilised temperature of the conventional air cooler was an unsafe 74C, whereas the innovative evaporative cooler maintained a much lower 47C.
Both coolers were of identical geometry and were operated under identical environmental conditions.
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