Multi-Split Configuration Design for Fluid-Based Thermal Management Systems

Abstract High power density systems require efficient cooling to maintain their thermal performance. Despite this, as systems get larger and more complex, human expertise and insight may not suffice to determine the desired thermal management system designs. To this end, a framework for automatic architecture exploration is presented in this article for a class of single-phase, multi-split cooling systems. For this class of systems, heat generation devices are clustered based on their spatial information, and flow splits are added only when required and at the location of heat devices. To generate different architectures, candidate architectures are represented as graphs. From these graphs, dynamic physics models are created automatically using a graph-based thermal modeling framework. Then, an optimal fluid flow distribution problem is solved by addressing temperature constraints in the presence of exogenous heat loads to achieve optimal performance. The focus in this work is on the design of general multi-split heat management systems. The methods presented here can be used for diverse applications in the domain of configuration design. The multi-split algorithm can produce configurations where splitting can occur at any of the vertices. The results presented include three categories of problems and are discussed in detail.