Aircraft Thermal Management -Heat Sink Challenge

Complex, high-powered electronics used on modern aircraft generate large amounts of heat, and the complexity and energy demands only grow with each new generation of electronics. Commensurate heat sinks capable of absorbing this load are the crucial element in an aircraft's thermal management system, and so the capacities of heat sinks must evolve with this electronics growth. This paper presents an industry survey of conventional heat sinks in current use and then introduces and discusses potential advances in heat sink technologies. These technologies show significant promise to increase the capacity of thermal management systems on future aircraft and thereby unlock the full performance of next generation electronics.