Concepts and realization of microstructure heat exchangers for enhanced heat transfer

Microstructure heat exchangers have unique properties that make them useful for numerous scientific and industrial applications. The power transferred per unit volume is mainly a function of the distance between heat source and heat sink—the smaller this distance, the better the heat transfer. Another parameter governing for the heat transfer is the lateral characteristic dimension of the heat transfer structure; in the case of microchannels, this is the hydraulic diameter. Decreasing this characteristic dimension into the range of several 10s of micrometers leads to very high values for the heat transfer rate.

Another possible way of increasing the heat transfer rate of a heat exchanger is changing the flow regime. Microchannel devices usually operate within the laminar flow regime. By changing from microchannels to three dimensional structures, or to planar geometries with microcolumn arrays, a significant increase of the heat transfer rate can be achieved.

Microheat exchangers in the form of both microchannel devices (with different hydraulic diameters) and microcolumn array devices (with different microcolumn layouts) are presented and compared. Electrically heated microchannel devices are presented, and industrial applications are briefly described.