Micro-Pump is Cool Idea for Future Computer Chips

core plexus writes to tell us that Engineers at Purdue University have designed a tiny 'micro-pump' cooling device that can be used to circulate coolant through the channels etched on an individual chip. From the article: "The prototype chip contains numerous water-filled micro-channels, grooves about 100 microns wide, or about the width of a human hair. The channels are covered with a series of hundreds of electrodes, electronic devices that receive varying voltage pulses in such a way that a traveling electric field is created in each channel. The traveling field creates ions, or electrically charged atoms and molecules, which are dragged along by the moving field."

Not exactly one for the modders

[Anonymous Coward]

The smallest particle in the coolant would block it.

Re:Cooling channels allow chip fabrication in 3D!

[ShakaUVM]

The trouble is that routing on chips isn't done by hand anymore. An algorithm crunches away on a design and spits out what it found to be the most optimal layout for the given parameters. So if you have to start pushing things around by hand in order to make room for cooling channels, it could break your design.

I'd say the solution to it would be to lay out the cooling channels just like other routes in the die, and set the parameters up somehow in the routes would be relatively well distributed for maximum heat absorption.

Electric fields strong enough to push particles...

[imgod2u]

I'm no expert in ASIC design but that doesn't sound like the best thing to have in your extremely sensitive high-speed signals. I assume this field will remain constant and won't provide noise for the chip (or at least I hope) but it will introduce an electrical bias that needs to be planned and compensated for during the chip's layout.

Re:Not exactly one for the modders

[Chr0nik]

True, in fact it's a kind of catch-22. Dirty water is more conductive than clean water. Using an EHD drive to pump the water is ingenious, but if the water's too clean it won't efficiently pump through the channels, if it's even slightly dirty, there will be mineral build up which will block the channels and fry your chip. Perhaps some other electrolytic fluid will work better, but I can't think of any with better thermal conductivity that won't boil at room temperatures. Good idea though. Using a refrigerant and the temperature gradient in the case would probably be a better idea. The problem with that however, is you'd be forced to have your case at a specific orientation in relation to the cooling device. There would have to be different versions for stand up cases, and rack mount or desktop cases.