Boiling heat transfer enhancement using deformable composite surfaces integrated with shape memory alloys

• A novel deformable composite surface integrating SMA and GO has been developed. • The surface dynamically transitions from curved to upright microstructures with temperature. • This adaptive behavior optimizes heat transfer throughout the entire boiling process. • Achieves up to 134.12 % CHF and 157.89 % HTC enhancement over polished surfaces. Conventional boiling surfaces with fixed geometries have their optimal performance confined to specific thermal conditions. Although shape memory alloys (SMA) enable adaptive heat transfer enhancement, prior studies have predominantly focused on single-scale deformable structures. This study innovatively proposes a deformable composite surface (DCS) by integrating graphene oxide (GO) nanostructures with SMA-based deformable microstructures. The DCS responds to temperature variations by adaptively transforming its microscopic morphology from a curved state to an upright state. Such dynamic transformation optimizes bubble nucleation during the initial boiling stage, and facilitates bubble detachment and liquid rewetting in the mid-late boiling stage. The core innovation of this study lies in achieving a dual synergistic mechanism of deformable microstructure and nanostructure continuous enhancement. This unique synergistic effect overcomes the limitations of static surfaces. Ultimately, compared to a polished surface (PS), the DCS achieves up to 134.12 % enhancement in critical heat flux (CHF) and 157.89 % improvement in heat transfer coefficient (HTC). These results demonstrate the excellent adaptive thermal management capability of the DCS, showing its great application potential for emerging thermal management in high-power-density systems, such as data centers.