Modeling and Experimental Characterization of Metal Microtextured Thermal Interface Materials.

A metal microtextured thermal interface material (MMT-TIM) has been proposed to address some of the shortcomings of conventional TIMs. These materials consist of arrays of small-scale metal features that plastically deform when compressed between mating surfaces, conforming to the surface asperities of the contacting bodies and result-ing in a low-thermal resistance assembly. The present work details the development of an accurate thermal model to predict the thermal resistance and effective thermal conductiv-ity of the assembly (including contact and bulk thermal properties) as the MMT-TlMs undergo large plastic deformations. The main challenge of characterizing the thermal contact resistance of these structures was addressed by employing a numerical model to characterize the bulk thermal resistance and estimate the contribution of thermal contact resistance. Furthermore, a correlation that relates electrical and thermal contact resist-ance for these MMT-TlMs was developed that adequately predicted MMT-TIM properties for several different geometries. A comparison to a commercially available graphite TIM is made as well as suggestions for optimizing future MMT-TIM designs. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]