High Performance Heat Spreaders for High Heat Flux Power Electronic Modules

The addition of advanced power electronics, radar, armor and weapons systems will significantly increase the thermal load onboard the Navy’s future warships. Advanced Cooling Technologies, Inc. (ACT), supported by Alstom Power Conversion and American Competitiveness Institute (ACI), will develop a high performance oscillating flow heat spreader technology for cooling of high power electronics through this Navy SBIR program. ACT has successfully demonstrated the feasibility of the oscillating flow heat spreader technology in cooling ultra high heat flux sources through the Phase I project. The proposed Phase II project will design, fabricate, integrate and test prototype heat spreaders in sub-scale power conversion module, wide band gap device and ETO transistor. Both Alstom and ACI will be involved in defining the baseline application requirements and prototype heat spreader design, integration and testing. Successful demonstration in Phase II will establish a firm foundation for the Phase II Option and Phase III efforts in demonstrating the technology in full scale systems and manufacturing for actual market applications.