Smart cooling: Hydrogel-enhanced adaptive jet impingement utilizing through silicon via for integrated microsystems

Publication
Applied Thermal Engineering, 268, 125895

In three-dimensional integrated circuits, disparities in power usage across various areas result in inconsistent temperature distributions, potentially jeopardizing system stability and dependability. Although microchannels etched on the back of the chip are frequently employed for cooling, standard designs typically offer a fixed cooling capacity, often failing to effectively target specific hotspots. Furthermore, straight microchannels extending throughout the entire setup can lead to excessive cooling in low-power zones and inadequate cooling in areas of high power consumption. This research introduces an innovative adaptive jet impingement cooling structure that merges hydrogel, jet impingement heat sink (JIHS), and through silicon via (TSV) technologies. The structure incorporates vertical channels and leverages the thermally responsive deformation of hydrogel to facilitate adaptive cooling. This configuration enables the cooler to be strategically positioned at hotspots, dynamically modulating microfluidic injection in reaction to temperature variations. Consequently, it alleviates overcooling in low-power zones while ensuring adequate cooling in hotspots, thereby enhancing thermal uniformity. In comparison to conventional jet impingement sinks, the proposed adaptive model enhances temperature uniformity by 12.21%, decreases thermal spreading resistance by 13%, and only slightly raises the maximum total thermal resistance by 3.08%. The maximum pressure drop experiences a minor increase of just 1.28 kPa.