How Does An Extended Surface Help in Electronics Cooling?

Extended surfaces commonly denoted as heatsinks provide an increased surface area that can be available for removing dissipated heat from the electronic components. Choosing the right material, an optimized geometry of heatsink, and the proper geometry characteristics of it, guarantee the best thermal management of the medium.

It has been proven that the longer the surface area of the electronic component, the more space there is for heat to be transferred from the component to the ambient. This larger surface set provides more heat removal opportunities than a flat surface, which is the advantage of it.

Heatsinks offer a much more extensive surface-to-air interface than other components due to the presence of long surfaces such as fins. This fins/pillars would be used to transfer the heat to the ambient air, and the airflow would either be passive or active in order to assist the process.

It is important that the heatsink’s geometry matches the electronic application so that the airflow passing through the channel can be directed to remove heat more efficiently than when the air is still. As a result of the extended surfaces, the heat that is localized in a small footprint is spread to a much larger area, and this expands the absorbed energy. Having this improvement will help prevent the overheating of electronic components and result in a more uniform distribution of temperature. It is important to be aware that heat is easily transferred to the ambient air by using high conductive materials such as copper or aluminum.