Novel ultrathin vapor chambers with anti-centrifugal wick structures for heat dissipation under high-g loads

Ultrathin vapor chamber (UTVC) is considered an ideal solution to the heat dissipation problem of aircraft and spacecraft. However, the cooling performance rapidly deteriorates due to the obstruction of the liquid return flow under acceleration overload, posing a serious threat to the safety of the spacecraft. More seriously, few theoretical models can reveal the mechanism of heat transfer under centrifugal conditions, resulting in an increase in the design cost and difficulty of the anti-centrifugal ultrathin vapor chamber (ACUTVC). Herein, two novel ACUTVCs based on the anti-centrifugal wicks were proposed, which were extensively tested and compared with the UTVC based on the traditional wick. Results show that the effective thermal conductivities of the ACUTVCs exceed 1500 W m−1 K−1 even under extreme conditions of a 6 g acceleration, which are about four times that of copper and comparable to commercial graphene films, demonstrating reliable thermal management capability under high-g conditions. The heat transfer mechanisms under different centrifugal conditions were revealed by the theoretical model proposed in this work, with a maximum error of 26.27% compared to the experimental results, showing a good agreement. Model results highlight the potential optimization approaches of wick structures, which may guide the new directions for the design of the ACUTVC.