Numerical study and multi-optimization of heat transfer performance in counter flow minichannel heat sink with slots on ribs using NSGA-Ⅱ

Abstract

High temperature and nonuniformity temperature cause thermal failure and thermal deformation for high-heat flux electronic devices. To address this issue, a counter flow minichannel heat sink with slots on ribs is designed. A 3D conjugated heat transfer model based on computational fluid dynamics (CFD) was developed to investigate effect of slots number (i) and growth rate of slot width (j) on average Nusselt number (Nu), local temperature distribution and temperature standard deviation (σ). The results show that design parameters i and j significantly influence heat transfer capability and temperature uniformity. However, there is no clear pattern between design parameters (i and j) and heat transfer performance (Nu and σ) to guide design. Furthermore, a non-dominated sequencing genetic algorithm (NSGA-Ⅱ) multi-objective optimization coupled Artificial Neural Network (ANN) is conducted with the consideration of maximum Nusselt number Nu and minimum temperature standard deviation (σ) as objectives. Technique for Order Preference by Similarity to Ideal Solution (TOPSIS) method is employed to determine the best solution from the Pareto front, i.e., multi-objective optimization solutions set. The optimized solution obtains 2.1 times increase in average Nusselt number and 0.36 times decrease in temperature standard deviation compared with conventional counter flow minichannel heat sink. This work serves as a guideline for designing minichannel heat sinks for thermal management of electronic components.