High-performance phase-change materials to better deal with overheating problems in data centers

Servers and switches in data centers currently use air cooling, liquid cooling, etc. for heat dissipation. In actual tests, the main heat dissipation component of the server is the CPU. In addition to air cooling or liquid cooling, choosing a suitable thermal interface material can assist in heat dissipation and reduce the thermal resistance of the entire thermal management link.

For thermal interface materials, the importance of high thermal conductivity is self-evident, and the main purpose of adopting a thermal solution is to reduce thermal resistance to achieve fast heat transfer from the processor to the heat sink.

Among thermal interface materials, thermal grease and phase change materials have better gap filling ability (interfacial wetting ability) than thermal pads, and achieve a very thin adhesive layer, thereby providing lower thermal resistance. However, thermal grease tends to be dislocated or expelled over time, resulting in loss of filler and loss of heat dissipation stability.

Phase change materials remain solid at room temperature and will only melt when a specified temperature is reached, providing stable protection for electronic devices up to 125°C. In addition, some phase change material formulations can also achieve electrical insulation functions. At the same time, when the phase change material returns to a solid state below the phase transition temperature, it can avoid being expelled and have better stability throughout the lifetime of the device.