TIPS PUBLICATIONS

Packaging electronic devices is a growing challenge as device performance and power levels escalate. As device feature sizes decrease, ensuring reliable operation becomes a challenge. Ensuring effective heat transfer from an integrated circuit and its heat spreader to a heat sink is a vital step in meeting this challenge. The projected power density and junction-to-ambient thermal resistance for high-performance chips at the 14 nm generation are >100 Wcm−2 and <0.2 °CW−1, respectively. The main bottleneck in reducing the net thermal resistance are the thermal resistances of the thermal interface material (TIM). This review evaluates the current state of the art of TIMs. Here, the theory of thermal surface interaction will be addressed and the practicalities of the measurement techniques and the reliability of TIMs will be discussed. Furthermore, the next generation of TIMs will be discussed in terms of potential thermal solutions in the realisation of Internet of Things.

Kafil M.Razeeb, Eric Dalton, Graham Lawerence William Cross & Anthony James Robinson.

Alcatel Lucent. Nov 2014. Thermal management has traditionally been relegated to the last step in the design process. However, with the exponential growth in data traffic leading to ever-greater levels of component integration and ever-higher levels of energy consumption, thermal management is rapidly becoming one of the most critical areas of research within the ICT industry.

Ryan Enright, Shenghui Lei, Kevin Nolan, Ian Mathews, Alexandre Shen, Guillaume Levaufre, Ronan Frizzell, Guang-Hua Duan & Domhnaill Hernon.