Fabrication and Thermal Characterization of Novel Copper-CNT Micropillars for Electronics Cooling Applications

This paper presents an experimental investigation to study the thermal and material characterization of an array of composite copper-carbon nanotubes (CNT) micropillars for applications in passive two-phase cooling systems. These novel micropillar structures have a larger spacing at the base of the micropillars to provide a higher liquid permeability and mushroom-like structures on the top surface of the micropillars with a smaller spacing to provide a greater capillary pressure. First, composite copper-CNT micropillars are fabricated by an electrodeposition method on a patterned copper template. Then, cauliflower-like nanostructures are grown on the top surface of the micropillars using chronoamperometry technique to improve the capillary pressure and thermal performance of the micropillars. Finally, a series of tests are conducted to quantify the thermal performance of the fabricated micropillars. The results indicate that the performance of mushroom-like composite copper-CNT micropillars is significantly higher than those of copper micropillar arrays.