Thermal management of high-power LED based on thermoelectric cooler and nanofluid-cooled microchannel heat sink

Abstract Effective thermal management for light-emitting diodes (LEDs) is critical, as temperature significantly affects their lifetime and performance. In this study, a system combining a thermoelectric cooler (TEC) and a microchannel heat sink (MHS) is investigated experimentally for thermal management of high-power LEDs. Nanofluids and water are used as coolant. The LED substrate temperature (Ts) is measured at various TEC powers, nanofluid concentrations, ambient temperatures of LED (Ta), and ambient temperatures of the fluid radiator (Ta,f). The effective thermal resistance (Rs-fa) of the LED substrate to the ambient of the fluid radiator is analyzed. Correlations of Ts and Rs-fa are obtained. Results show that the Ts is lowest when the TEC works at its rated power, and Ts is lower than Ta at Ta ≥ 55 °C. Using nanofluids instead of water as coolant reduces the Ts by up to 18.5 °C and decreases the thermal resistance by as much as 42.4%. The MHS heat transfer capacity is increased by 38.6%. The Ta,f exhibites greater influence on Ts compared to Ta. Results show that favorable performance of the thermal management of the high-power LED is obtained by the proposed nanofluid-cooled TEC-MHS system, particularly at high ambient temperature of LED.