Micro and miniature heat pipes – Electronic component coolers

The time of beginning of heat pipe science was near 40 years ago with first heat pipe definition and prediction of most simple cases. Micro and miniature heat pipes have received considerable attention in the past decade. The interest stems from the possibility of achieving the extremely high heat fluxes near 1000 W/cm2, needed for future generation electronics cooling application. Now at the computer age some changes of basic equations are performed, more powerful predicting methods are available with increasing awareness of the complexity of heat pipes and new heat pipe generations. But even today heat pipes are still not completely understood and solution strategies still contain significant simplifications. Micro and miniature heat pipes have some additional complications due to its small size. A short review on the micro and miniature heat pipes is presented.