博文

目前显示的是 七月, 2018的博文

Electronics Cooling from the Inside Out

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Electronic cabinets, or electronic enclosures, safely house electronics equipment inside a case for indoor or outdoor use. These units have a variety of uses, such as for housing the electrical components of a stop light, or housing the internal elements of a computer or other electronic equipment.  The cabinets help protect the electronic components from weather, human tampering, and dust. Most electronic enclosures require additional cooling pieces for the electronic items inside the box. If the electronic items get overheated, they can short out and cause problems with the unit. The cooling of the unit is extremely important, which is why so many casing companies focus on new and innovative cooling methods. Some newer electronic cabinets have cooling components built right into the casing system. These cooling systems contain air conditioning pieces that help maintain the desired temperature inside the unit no matter what the outside temperature is, or how hot the ...

How does a TEC (thermoelectric cooler) work? What does its parameter mean (Th, Q, or Delta T)?

A TEC (Thermoelectric cooler) is an application that harnesses thermoelectricity, more specifically, the Peltier effect. This is basically turning an electrical voltage input into a temperature difference. This is the converse of the Seebeck coefficient, which is turning a temperature difference into a voltage potential (used in Thermoelectric Generators). As for parameters for thermoelectrics in general, parameters would just be used to determine certain statistics for a specific scenario given. These would not only be used in calculating things like figure of merit (efficiency of the thermoelectric application, aka ΔZ), but also how effective your TEC would be. You asked about ΔT, Q, and Th. ΔΤ is the difference in temperature (i.e. your hot side is 200F, and your cold side is 20F, so 180 is your temp. difference). Q in this case could refer to either the charge/voltage of the application or some kind of heat factor. It would depend on your case to see what it would exactly mean. ...

What are the most novel applications of thermoelectrics?

There are two main categories of applications of thermoelectrics. The first is cooling and heating (thermal management) and the second is power generation. The term “novel” changes meaning from person to person and over time. My favorite application and probably most useful to humanity is in the category of power generation. Thermoelectrics can be used to convert body heat into electricity and this electricity is used to power electronics that allow implantable medical devices to operate without batteries. The advantage is the patient no longer needs to have surgery to replace the batteries. This reduces patient psychological and physical pain, reduces financial strain for the patient and health care system.