2006 Volume 14 Issue 2 Pages 27-33
For realizing high heat flux cooling to control the temperature of high energy consumption devices such as high coherency laser diodes, a new idea utilizing the thermoelectric property difference of dissimilar metals has been experimentally demonstrated. By measuring the thermoelectric potential for the thermoelectric cooling devices composed of several kinds of metal electrode, the combination of metals has been selected to obtain the largest thermoelectric potential. Then, the maximum value of the cooling heat flux has been experimentally obtained for the selected composition of the thermoelectric devices utilizing dissimilar metals. The thermoelectric potentials have been measured for the combination of three kinds of metal electrodes and n-type and p-type thermoelectric materials (TEM) in π-shape structure accompanied with positive electrode of Pt without solder. Temperature distribution was measured by thin film thermocouples and optical thermography. Consequently, by using the two kinds of electrode metal for the combination of Pt (+electrode) - n-type TEM - Pd - p-type TEM—Pt (-electrode), the maximum value of the thermoelectric potential was obtained. Furthermore, by utilizing the three kinds of metal for the combination of Pt (+electrode) - n-type TEM - Pd - p-type TEM—Au (-electrode), a larger value of the thermoelectric potential was obtained. With the utilization of the three kinds of dissimilar metals, maximum heat flux for the thermoelectric cooling device has been enhanced up to 2.3 W/cm2 by a factor of 1.4 compared with the case using one kind of metal.
