Copper-filled printed circuits, the miracle solution for cooling electronic devices?

A new circuit board design developed by OKI Circuit Technology promises to significantly improve the heat dissipation of electronic components using copper parts.

OKI Circuit Technology is a Japanese company present for around fifty years on the market of PCBthe other name for printed circuits found in all our electronic devices, from game consoles to laptops, smartphones, televisions and even connected objects. Drawing on its experience, the company has unveiled a new technique to significantly improve the heat dissipation of electronic components, especially in environments where traditional cooling methods, such as fans or heat sinks, are not feasible or are not very effective.

Cooling our electronic devices more efficiently

This innovation is based on the use of parts of copper stepped, similar to rivets passing right through the PCB, and which allow heat to be evacuated more efficiently than traditional solutions. Real thermal bridges, these copper parts have a variable thickness and shape to adapt to specific shapes of components or different thicknesses of printed circuits. The end in contact with the electronic component has a smaller diameter than the one dissipating heat, thus creating better thermal transfer.

This technology could have a significant impact in diverse areas, ranging from miniature devices to space applications, environments where heat dissipation represents a major challenge. Both simple and ingenious (so much so that we wonder why no one had thought of it before), the solutionOKI was thus shown to be up to 55 times better than traditional heat dissipation solutions in the vacuum of space. This feat is all the more remarkable since the absence of air in the space makes convection cooling systems, such as fans, ineffective. Electronic circuits must therefore rely primarily on thermal conduction and radiation to dissipate the heat generated by their components.

Also read: This small box could advantageously replace fans in laptops

From space electronics to the motherboards of our laptops

Although OKI’s technology is particularly suited to space applications, its potential goes well beyond that. It could indeed prove useful in other areas; we immediately think of the computer industry, where components are increasingly powerful and energy-intensive.

Motherboard manufacturers already use significant amounts of copper to improve heat dissipation, but OKI’s stepped copper parts could further improve their thermal performance. For example, it would be possible to conduct the heat from the components of a laptop or smartphone to cooling plates located at the back of the PCB, or even why not directly to the chassis of the device. Enough to design more efficient passive cooling systems, with a reduction in noise and energy consumption…