Ionic wind cools chips

A UNIVERSITYof Washington boffin has worked out a way of using Ionic wind to cool his chips.

Ukrainian born Alexander Mamishev reckons that corona discharge, ionic wind or electrostatic fluid acceleration could be the next best thing to keep chips from overheating.

Mamishev, who was a high-voltage physicist in Ukraine hit on the idea when thinking about problems coming from his high-voltage physics background, as you do.

He was ruminating on corona discharges which are the product of some ionised air molecules. It is a bit like St Elmo's fire, only it doesn't involve Demi Moore or that annoying Andie MacDowell.

Mamishev realised that the ions push the air over chips and with a bit of research cash behind him he could make a microchip air conditioner. He said his working prototype was so small it could be integrated into the chip.

Each cooling chip comes in two bits. One is an emitter, which is one-three-hundredth of the width of a human hair, creates the ions. The other is dubbed the collector which captures the ions at the other end of the chip.

More here.