Designing thermoelectric self-cooling system for electronic devices: Experimental investigation and model validation

Abstract

Thermal management of electronic devices is encountering a bottleneck due to the continuously increased heat flux generated from equipment. Fortunately, the development of thermoelectric self-cooling (TESC) technology provides new opportunities for cooling electronic devices passively. In this paper, a practical application of the TESC technology on an ultra-high performance (UHP) lamp used in commercial projectors is investigated both experimentally and numerically. Experimental results show that once the TESC system is carefully designed, it can perform better than conventional forced cooling systems with no power consumed. A numerical model is further established based on the thermal resistance-capacitance network. The comparison between experimental and simulation results proves the accuracy of the proposed model. The dynamic deviation of the numerical model is within 9%, and the steady-state deviation is within 2%. Furthermore, a parametric study is conducted to analyze the influence of different physical properties and structures of thermoelectric materials. Results indicate that choosing an appropriate configuration of physical properties is more important than purely improving the dimensionless figure of merit. Additionally, about 70% of the thermoelectric materials can be saved if a suitable fill factor and thickness of thermoelectric pairs were utilized.