A high heat flux IGBT micro exchanger setup

Much progress has been made over the past few years in the design of power electronic components leading to increasing development of IGBT transistors. Now IGBT's can dissipate power densities higher than 400 W/cm/sup 2/ and the thermal environment has become a major factor in their behavior. The aim of this paper is to demonstrate the high performance of a silicon microchannel setup. First, a thermal study enables the theoretical behavior of the setup to be analyzed. Then an optimization method based on genetic algorithms allows us to determine the best sizes for the microchannels. Finally, the theoretical results are compared with experimental measurements.