Researchers at the University of Waterloo (UW) are developing a new way to keep computer chips from overheating, using tiny drops of boiling liquid to target particularly hot areas. The research comes amid growing demand for artificial intelligence, putting more pressure on the massive data centres that power the technology. Those facilities house thousands of computers to process information, which generates a significant amount of heat. But if certain areas of a computer chip become too hot, it can affect performance and reliability. The research team said its approach could help address those hotspots by directly cooling the areas that need it most. The technology uses water to manage everyday heat, while tiny drops of a specialized coolant target areas that become particularly hot. “We are basically combining two different technologies for the first time, which allows us to kind of cherry pick the advantages of both,” said PhD student Arnav Banerjee. In laboratory testing, a single drop lowered the temperature of a simulated computer chip hotspot by as much as 17 degrees Celsius in just 15 seconds. Sushanta Mitra is a professor in UW’s Department of Mechanical and Mechatronics Engineering and the executive director of the Waterloo Institute for Nanotechnology. He said the approach could also reduce costs. Current immersion cooling systems require more of the specialized coolant, while the UW method requires much smaller amounts. “You don’t need to use that expensive coolant across the entire loop,” Mitra explained. “You only need to use this at the drop.” He said the drops are only about one to two millimetres in size, meaning the amount of specialized coolant used is significantly reduced. The team is also exploring how the technology could help address the environmental risks associated with large-scale data centre cooling. The research is still in its early stages, with testing focused on a single computer chip. The next step is to develop a larger system that mimics how the coolant would circulate through a data centre. The team hopes the technology could eventually be adopted by data centres around the world, as well as other applications involving electronics that generate significant amounts of heat.
