Kronos Advanced Technologies, Inc. today announced that their Kronos Air Technologies, Inc. subsidiary and the University of Washington, Seattle, Wash., have been awarded continued funding for a research and development technology project on a cooling system for microelectronics and computer chips.
The Seattle-based Washington Technology Center, a state funded economic development agency focused on technology and innovation, will contribute $100,000 as a Phase II grant for the project. Kronos will provide $35,000 in funding, $38,000 in in-kind services, including use of the Kronos Research and Product Development Facility. Dr. Alexander Mamishev of the University of Washington Electrical Engineering Department is the principal investigator on the project and will lead a team of scientists and engineers from Kronos and Intel Corp. who will also collaborate on the project.
"Thermal management for microelectronics and MicroElectronics Mechanical Systems (MEMS) systems is a significant challenge as existing cooling devices do not meet the increasing need for efficient energy consumption and heat dissipation necessary for this rapidly growing and evolving market," stated Kronos president and CEO, Daniel R. Dwight. "The goal of this project is to develop heat transfer technology based on Electrostatic Fluid Acceleration (EFA), an emerging technology invented and developed by Kronos."
The technology utilizes an electric field to accelerate air to the speed previously achieved only by traditional blowers. The new microchip system is designed to enable the semiconductor industry to meet the demands of the next generation of microelectronics devices. "This project will leverage Kronos' patented and proprietary technology utilized in our air purification, decontamination and filtration systems," Dwight said.
In December 2004, under Phase I of the project, Kronos and the Washington Technology Center contributed $40,000 each in funding and in-kind services for the development of a working proof-of-concept micro-fabricated prototype EFA that achieves a dramatic reduction of surface temperature. In Phase II, the team will focus on designing, fabricating and testing the prototypes that meet the requirements of specific microelectronics applications.