Thermal Conductivity 29

This book presents the most current research on heat flow in materials, ranging from metals to newer materials such as thin films and nanowires.

"This is the 2008 volume in the ITCC/ITES book series on thermal conductivity, devoted to thermal conductivity performance in many types of engineered materials. The book comprises 52 original papers specially selected and edited from the ITCC 29/ITES17 conference, held in June 2007 at the University of Alabama, with support from the Southern Research Institute. New areas covered in this book include thermoelectrics, nuclear and aerospace materials, including the James Webb Space Telescope."--DEStech Publications web-site, viewed 15 January 2009

In additional to traditional topics such as thermal insulation, instrumentation and standards, the conference highlighted research in carbon nanotubes, nanomaterials, novel thin films, thermoelectric and composites.

This book contains keynote lectures and 54 technical papers, presented at the 23rd International Thermal Conductivity Conference, on various topics, including techniques, coatings and films, theory, composites, fluids, metals, ceramics, and organics, related to thermal conductivity.

Thedemandfore?cientthermalmanagementhasincreasedsubstantiallyover the last decade in every imaginable area, be it a formula 1 racing car suddenly braking to decelerate from 200 to 50 mph going around a sharp corner, a space shuttle entering the earth’s atmosphere, or an advanced microproc- sor operating at a very high speed. The temperatures at the hot junctions are extremely high and the thermal ?ux can reach values higher than a few 2 hundred to a thousand watts/cm in these applications. To take a speci?c example of the microelectronics area, the chip heat ?ux for CMOS microp- cessors, though moderate compared to the numbers mentioned above have 2 already reached values close to 100 W/cm , and are projected to increase 2 above 200 W/cm over the next few years. Although the thermal mana- ment strategies for microprocessors do involve power optimization through improved design, it is extremely di?cult to eliminate “hot spots” completely. This is where high thermal conductivity materials ?nd most of their appli- tions, as “heat spreaders”. The high thermal conductivity of these materials allows the heat to be carried away from the “hot spots” very quickly in all directions thereby “spreading” the heat. Heat spreading reduces the heat ?ux density, and thus makes it possible to cool systems using standard cooling solutions like ?nned heat sinks with forced air cooling.