20c Polymer Composites with Enhanced Thermal Conductivity

Plastics (polymers) are used widely in energy, industry, and defense sectors due to their low cost and weight, processibility, and electrical insulation properties. Unfortunately, this class of materials is also thermally insulating, which restricts their usefulness in applications where heat is generated and has a direct effect on the performance (e.g. electronics and computing, LED lighting, heat exchangers, etc.). The poor thermal conductivity of polymers currently results in the use of more expensive, heavier, and less processible metal components for heat-sensitive applications. Through this SBIR program, Tetramer Technologies will develop enhanced polymeric materials with thermal conductivity values of up to 2 orders of magnitude higher than current commodity plastics. The molecular architecture of the materials will be designed and synthesized to produce base materials with higher-than-average thermal conductivity. These materials will then be used to prepare composites with significantly improved thermal conductivity values, as compared to the base materials, alone. Tetramer will focus on designing the molecules and fillers for these composites to improve the physical mechanisms by which heat travels through the materials. The fundamentals of phonon heat transport will be leveraged to optimize thermal conductivity characteristics in the materials. A standard set of characterization tests will be used to evaluate the thermal and mechanical properties of the intermediate and final material compositions. This data will be fitted to predictive models that will enable further optimization of the material formulations for improved performance. Tetramer anticipates that these materials will find early adoption in electronics for the defense and energy industries. The ability to use polymeric materials as thermally conductive components in highperformance computing systems could significantly reduce costs, weight, and maintenance requirements associated with current metal components. The advantages of Reduced Size, Weight, and Power (SWaP) would be particularly useful in the aerospace industry.