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Technology Hardware

Silent Microchip 'Fan' Has No Moving Parts 136

Posted by samzenpus from the cool-off dept.
Stony Stevenson writes "Researchers in the US have developed a microchip fan with no moving parts that operates silently and generates enough wind to cool a laptop computer. The solid-state fan, developed with support from the US National Science Foundation (NSF), is touted as the most powerful and energy efficient fan of its size. The device produces three times the flow rate of a typical small mechanical fan and is one-fourth the size. The technology has the power to cool a 25W chip with a device smaller than one cubic-cm and can someday be integrated into silicon to make self-cooling chips, according to the researchers."
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Silent Microchip 'Fan' Has No Moving Parts More

Silent Microchip 'Fan' Has No Moving Parts

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  • Just when you thought anti-gravity [americanantigravity.com] was dead for good. Hey, at least this thing sounds like it will work as advertised...

    • Re: (Score:3, Interesting)

      by goombah99 ( 560566 )
      On the same day they announce the "best invention since the heat pipe", someone announces a better heat pipe---the room temperature super conductor! back to back articles [slashdot.org] annihilate.

  • nothing new.. (Score:5, Informative)

    by miknix ( 1047580 ) on Wednesday March 19, 2008 @07:29PM (#22802138) Homepage
    .. using ionic winds to cool the CPU isn't a new idea:

        http://inventgeek.com/Projects/IonCooler3/overview.aspx [inventgeek.com]

    • Re: (Score:3, Interesting)

      by TerranFury ( 726743 )

      Indeed. What's the date on that project? I didn't see one on the website. Me, I had posted a similar idea on the Halfbakery years ago: Here it is [halfbakery.com]. I guess this is an idea lots of people come up with?

      The novel part here, I'd say, is micromachining the thing on the die.

    • Re: (Score:3, Informative)

      by snl2587 ( 1177409 )

      Granted, the idea of using ionic wind isn't revolutionary, but I think the size is. One cubic centimeter for a 25W chip? Damn.

    • Re:nothing new.. (Score:4, Informative)

      by eclectic4 ( 665330 ) on Wednesday March 19, 2008 @08:00PM (#22802380)
      "..is touted as the most powerful and energy efficient fan of its size (no mention of it being a "new" idea). The device produces three times the flow rate of a typical small mechanical fan and is one-fourth the size. The technology has the power to cool a 25W chip with a device smaller than one cubic-cm..."

      I think the above is what's important. I believe the title of the article is just a tad misleading...
      • But what I want to know is what the performance hit will be on the battery.

        Is generation of this plasma more efficient then spinning a small fan?
    • I wish he would have estimated the CFM on that! If it's comparable to the whole 3x the air flow at 1/4 the size thing, that thing would start a small tornado in his case lol. Then again it doesn't have alleys and scoops like the attached image in the article so I don't think it's really, truly designed for maximized airflow. Pretty neat though. You know what I'm thinking is if they could line the inside walls of an air intake in a car or better yet assemble a bunch of those super high CFM chip coolers i
    • I think the point is missed. This technology can exist on the microchip, thereby avoiding any additional fan to cool the chip. (Albeit it mechanical, water-cooled, or yes even ionic wind CPU coolers [very cool indeed]). That's news to me.

    • Re: (Score:1, Funny)

      by Anonymous Coward
      Baked Beans have no moving parts but can generate enormous amounts of wind ... though I dont think it has been applied to CPU cooling yet. Now if the innovation had generated air flow instead of wind my comment would not be as punworthy.
    • That kit is pretty overpriced. The circuit is basically just a ladder of capacitors, with terminals at the appropriate points. You can get the circuit diagram on the web, but you may not even need that with some knowledge of capacitors. I built one about a year ago- not for tinkering with ionic breeze but for shocking the heck out of people. If you ground one side (aluminum foil on your shoe) and stick the other electrode to your body, you shock anyone who touches you.

  • Cool! (Score:5, Informative)

    by camperdave ( 969942 ) on Wednesday March 19, 2008 @07:29PM (#22802144) Journal
    I'm sure by now someone has said "Cool!"

    So this thing works similar to an ion drive. A stream of ions from one wire to another drags the surrounding air with it, generating wind. The last entry here [tfot.info] has a good graphic.

  • just a few seconds... (Score:5, Funny)

    by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday March 19, 2008 @07:31PM (#22802168)
    ...until someone tags this whatcouldpossiblygowrong.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by cnettel ( 836611 )
      Did you eject the ion pod before going to read alert? Is Finney still hiding within the heatsink?
    • Perhaps we could come up with some sort of arrangement where this tag is removed once someone identifies something that could possibly go wrong.

  • Now this should be on the list... (Score:4, Interesting)

    by The Ancients ( 626689 ) on Wednesday March 19, 2008 @07:34PM (#22802190) Homepage

    The TR list discussed here, that is: http://science.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=08/03/12/176227 [slashdot.org]

    This I can see as having many applications, including those rather warm MacBookAirs ;-)

  • If it is 3 times "stronger", at 1/4th the size, why not say it is 12 times as efficient as a conventional fan?

    • Re: (Score:3, Informative)

      by Sepiraph ( 1162995 )
      Because this way it gives you more information on both size and efficency factors and a better idea than simply saying 12 times as strong (some information is lost).
    • Because it's more informative to say the way they did? The queen mary 2 has an awesome cooling source (the ocean) making it thousands of times more efficient than a fan, but I'm not bolting the EQ2 to my cpu.

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by johnw ( 3725 )
        I think you mean "effective", not "efficient". Using the QM2 to cool your CPU would be incredibly inefficient.

    • Re: (Score:2, Interesting)

      by Sunthalazar ( 69878 )
      Also, if you are saying "efficient", in my mind that means Cooling per Watt, which they *didn't* mention.

      I was very curious to know how many Watts it would take to cool a 25W microchip. If it is taking 50W whereas a fan would take 10mW.

      I believe that Peltier's suffer from this. They are nice fanless systems that can cool below ambient temperature. But it takes more that 1 W per 1 W of cooling.

  • Timing is everything (Score:3, Interesting)

    by cizoozic ( 1196001 ) on Wednesday March 19, 2008 @07:36PM (#22802208)
    Just in time for Room-Temperature Superconductors! [slashdot.org] Oh monkeytrumpets.

    But seriously, it sounds pretty... cool... and the article suggests that it uses plasma on extremely small scale, which is also pretty nifty. My concern would be dust. Every laptop I've had turns into a dustbuster that continuously cleans my desk. Unfortunately the collection cup (the fan and ducting) isn't easily removable. Maybe just use two of them in series but configure the first as an Ionic Breeze? Isn't that essentially what this thing is anyway? If it is, I don't know how the Ionic Breeze descriptions managed to omit the word PLASMA in their Sharper Image ads.
    • You're right about the dust. I had an Ionic Breeze air purifier, and the static charge it had made it a dust magnet. I have pets and hardwood floors (which increases the amount of dust you have floating around the house because there's no carpet for it to get caught in), so the thing had to be cleaned all the time, and when it was dirty it made an incredible amount of noise.
  • I would definitely consider this for a low-noise workstation setup, assuming it scaled properly. Probably wouldn't provide enough cooling power for the beefier processors, but I bet it could be adapted for a mid-range desktop machine. Silence is golden.

    Yeah, I know, there's so much more you could do with this than providing quiet cooling for a budget system. I see new tech and the first thing I think about is rednecking it onto old tech.

  • Some technical info and pic... (Score:5, Informative)

    by fractalrock ( 662410 ) on Wednesday March 19, 2008 @07:39PM (#22802246)
    Can be found here. [thorrn.com]

  • Bah (Score:1)

    by od05 ( 915556 )
    Like Static Bars? I use these at work, they put out quite a bit of wind with no moving parts...Nothing to see here... http://www.simco-static.com/data/PLStaticBars.shtml [simco-static.com]

  • Intel Nehalem (Score:3, Insightful)

    by Armon ( 932023 ) on Wednesday March 19, 2008 @07:50PM (#22802320)
    I hope this technology finds its way onto Intel Nehalem... SSD + SS Fan = Dead silent laptop Now if only we could get batteries 12 times more efficient
  • Ooh, more O2 for your Li-Ion fires!

  • I wonder (Score:5, Insightful)

    by no-body ( 127863 ) on Wednesday March 19, 2008 @08:01PM (#22802388)
    how this would held up in a dusty environment - Q-Tips still working?

    • Re:I wonder (Score:5, Interesting)

      by Pollux ( 102520 ) <speter@[ ]ata.net.eg ['ted' in gap]> on Wednesday March 19, 2008 @10:31PM (#22803298) Journal
      Actually, this is a very good point that the parent brings up. The way corona discharge is possible is to push a very high voltage with very low amperage through a very small electrode. The high voltage creates the ion flow, but the low amperage prevents arcing from occuring. However, if a pool of dust collects between the electrodes, you'll have an easy path for the electricity to arc across.

      Not to mention that you better not drop a screw in the case while it's in operation! Or a screwdriver, or a paper clip, or other random metalic objects.

      Brilliant idea, neat application, but there's always a risk involved when you're playing with high voltage, even micro-amps worth.
      • Wouldn't an arc just fry the dust bunny, annihilating it instantaneously, releasing a burst of fragrance similar to burning hair? That's a pretty neat trick for a laptop.
      • Yeah, just like in piezoelectric gas lighters. They have typically thousands of volts.
  • When I read the title about a microchip fan, I thought they were talking about micromechanics--I may have the name wrong but I'm talking about tiny miniature mechanical systems that can be integrated into a chip-like package, like a microscopic gearbox that was demonstrated a while back. But this is way cooler: Generating a tiny corona wind by way of physics and chemistry to create a flow of air is definitely a breakthrough, and in retrospect (which is always 20/20), using a fan to cool a chip is rather the

  • Great but.... (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Assassin bug ( 835070 ) on Wednesday March 19, 2008 @08:13PM (#22802456) Journal
    Proprietary product [thorrn.com] produced via NSF funding at Prudue University (a public Land Grant university)? Hasn't there been some talk about public access to NSF-funded research?
  • I admit to not having a clue about it, but wonder if these devices could be stacked to make a very thin personal cooling fan. It'd probably be a tad expensive, but I can see a market for it even so, especially in offices. If nothing else, it'd be a new toy for the moderately wealthy, leading to larger economies of scale that let ordinary slobs like us own it too. What with all this talk about ions, I wonder if it could be tweaked to pump out negative ions, which allegedly improve mood [alaska.edu].

  • "Of its size" (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Guppy ( 12314 ) on Wednesday March 19, 2008 @08:25PM (#22802548)

    the most powerful and energy efficient fan of its size.
    "Of its size" is the important part. From what I can tell, it's not that the device is so much more efficient that rotary fans in general, but that rotary fans do not scale down in size -- if you look at a 25mm PC cooling fans, the motor hub takes up most of the tiny cross-section available, leaving little stubby fins that manage to move only a pittance despite whining at high RPMs.

  • Sounds like BS. (Score:2, Interesting)

    by Blice ( 1208832 )
    From plasma discharge, to omitting ozone, to collecting dust... This thing sounds like way too much trouble than it's worth. While the concept sounds amazing and I would love to be able to implement these into UMPCs and laptops, it's just going to do more harm than good.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by g-san ( 93038 )
      Not even if it lets us live happier, more fulfilled lives?!!?

      Looking at my ionic air purifier and already thinking no freaking way. Why not just hook up your clothes dryer vent to your PC case, pop out the lint screen, toss a few towels in and pray.

  • Hooray for Ozone generators! (Score:4, Insightful)

    by Khyber ( 864651 ) <techkitsune@gmail.com> on Wednesday March 19, 2008 @08:33PM (#22802598) Homepage Journal
    Just what I don't need, free-radical generators. Not only is it a component of smog, but it's bad for organic substances as well. No thanks, I'll stick with a ball-bearing fan.
  • It's called a quarter ffs.
  • From the looks of a report [purdue.edu] on Purdue's website, it's been undergoing research since at least 2003.

  • Not as cool as it looks. . . (Score:3, Informative)

    by puppetluva ( 46903 ) on Wednesday March 19, 2008 @08:47PM (#22802702)
    I hear that the only downside to this new technology is that it throws off a lot of heat.

    I hate to burst your bubble, Fanbois. . .

    ba-dum, bum
  • It appears that the size comparisons for this device do not include the dimensions of the high voltage power supply needed to operate it. It's possible that the efficiency numbers don't include the power supply conversion efficiency either. Since small, efficient high voltage power supplies tend to be highly nontrivial and somewhat expensive to build, that is a significant hurdle to adoption. Consider the size and power draw of the inverter needed to power the backlight in a laptop, and now consider that
  • Does it have lips?
  • So when does the jet engine version come out?

  • ...a microchip fan with no moving parts that operates silently and generates enough wind to cool a laptop computer.

    Well, if I eat a couple of bean burritos, I can usually generate that much wind easily.

    Unfortunately, it's seldom silent or cool. :-/

  • Efficiency (Score:3, Interesting)

    by flyingfsck ( 986395 ) on Wednesday March 19, 2008 @10:01PM (#22803140)
    Hmm, what they are not saying is that they are likely using 30W of power to cool a 25W chip...
  • I found the articles fascinating and... Way Cool (pun intended).

    The High-Velocity aspect of the fan v. volumes was also very interesting. Faster isn't always better.
  • Can I get one for my house?
  • Any tiny thing with a tiny coil around it and hook it to a battery will result in flight if you let it!
  • ...for a second I thought it said self-COOKING chips. We already have those.
  • If these things are mass-produced and cheap, I can see people experimenting with modulating the high voltage to use them as plasma tweeters:
    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Plasma_arc_loudspeaker [wikipedia.org]

    In the past, such tweeters have been used in a few expensive high end loudspeakers, but if it is shown they can be built cheaply they might become more common.
  • Does this produce ozone? -- because that would be bad.

    The article seems to imply that the "wind" has a neutral charge, but that's generally not how ionic wind works. (Molecules with a charge are pushed away from a like-charged surface).

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