Active Radar System Thermal Management

This Small Business Innovation Research Phase I project, will investigate manufacturing of shims and cold plates from ultra high thermal conductivity composites for thermal management of wide band gap active component in T/R modules for S-band and X-band radar. This materials based design approach will utilize ultra high conductivity Diamond/Aluminum and Diamond/Copper materials made by MER. To produce a commercial product, the focus will be on improving machinability and surface finish of these composite materials parts to allow direct insertion into T/R module designs to replace existing materials of Copper-Tungsten and Copper/Molybdenum/Copper. The tremendous commercial potential of this product is for broad use as a thermal management material in power electronics for SiC, GaAs and Si based devices.