Thermal interface materials (TIMs) such as thermal pastes, films, pads, adhesives, and gels are an integral component of chip cooling assemblies. Of these, thermal pastes are capable of achieving the highest thermal conductivities, on the order of 5 W/m-K and - more importantly – can achieve some of the lowest thermal resistivities since as liquids – albeit of high viscosity - they can conform to any surface within the chip – cooling lid gap. One of the most important TIM properties is long-term stability of its thermal resistivity. This property is rather unique to thermal pastes, since most highly filled composites used in areas such as explosives, soaps or food products [1-8] exist in the liquid phase only for a short period during processing.
By: C. Feger; M. McGlashan-Powell; I. Nnebre; D. M. Kalyon
Published in: RC23869 in 2006
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