As the power dissipated by advanced microelectronic devices continues to increase, the demand for reliability also increases. This increases the requirements on the thermal performance of every part of the system, including the heat sink. One of the objectives of this study is to examine the effect of shape of the heat sink fins on the thermal performance of the system. The pressure gradient from the fan to the base of the heat sink, near the center, tends to be high. This significantly reduces the airflow at that location and, hence, decreases transport in that region. Parallel plate heat sinks have been investigated by removing fin material near the center along the length and height of the fins. The junction-to-ambient temperature difference and pressure drop are adopted as thermal performance characteristics. Five design variables related to the fin shape were considered and the most significant influential geometric parameters for minimizing the objective functions identified using the analysis of variance (ANOVA) approach. Different fin shapes have been studied with the objective of searching for a new optimal heat sink design by optimizing the variables that improve the thermal performance without increasing pressure drop across the heat sink.

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As the power dissipated by advanced microelectronic devices continues to increase, the demand for reliability also increases. This increases the requirements on the thermal performance of every part of the system, including the heat sink. One of the objectives of this study is to examine the effect of the shape of the heat sink fins on the thermal performance of the system. The pressure gradient at the center of the heat sink, near the base, tends to be high. This significantly reduces the airflow at that location and, hence, decreases transport in that region. Different fin shapes and airflow rates have been studied with the objective of searching for an optimal heat sink design that would improve the thermal performance without increasing the pressure drop across the heat sink. Parallel plate fins have been investigated by removing fin material from the region near the center of the heat sink along the length and height of the fins. The study also examines the impact of uniform and non-uniform heat sources in the device upon the overall system thermal performance. Twenty one heat sink designs with different cuts were simulated and compared and an improved heat sink design was proposed by eliminating the fin material at the center of the heat sink, thereby enhancing its thermal performance.