Multilayer PCBs Embedded with Cooling Microchannels for High Power Electronic Devices in Wireless Systems

This paper presents an integrated microfluidic cooling scheme on the multilayer FR4 printed circuit board (PCB) for high power electronic devices. The fabrication process is completely based on the standard multilayer PCB technology. A four-layer FR4 PCB embedded with a cooling microchannel has been design, fabricated and tested. The fabricated PCB is 2 mm thick, while the microchannel has a height of 444.6 μm, which is related to the thickness of internal laminates. Thermal experiment of the PCB has been performed by using a plastic radio frequency (RF) power amplifier (PA) device with heat flux of 12.9 W/cm
²
, whose steady-state case temperature is decreased to 46°C with a flow rate of 30 mL/min.