Strategies for enhancing thermal conductivity of polymer-based thermal interface materials: a review

Thermal management has been considered as a key issue for high-power electronics. Thermal interface materials (TIMs) play an extremely important role in the field of thermal management. Owing to their excellent insulation, mechanical properties and low processing costs, functional polymers have beco...

Full description

Saved in:
Bibliographic Details
Published in:Journal of materials science 2021-01, Vol.56 (2), p.1064-1086
Main Authors: Ma, Haoqi, Gao, Bin, Wang, Meiyu, Yuan, Zhenye, Shen, Jingbo, Zhao, Jingqi, Feng, Yakai
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Characterization and Evaluation of Materials
Chemistry and Materials Science
Classical Mechanics
Crystallography and Scattering Methods
Fillers
Heat conductivity
Heat transfer
Insulation
Materials Science
Mechanical properties
Polymer industry
Polymer Sciences
Polymers
Power electronics
Review
Solid Mechanics
Thermal conductivity
Thermal energy
Thermal management
Thermal resistance
Citations: Items that this one cites
Items that cite this one
Online Access:Get full text
Tags: Add Tag
No Tags, Be the first to tag this record!
Description
Summary:Thermal management has been considered as a key issue for high-power electronics. Thermal interface materials (TIMs) play an extremely important role in the field of thermal management. Owing to their excellent insulation, mechanical properties and low processing costs, functional polymers have become the popular candidate for preparing TIMs. In order to develop high thermally conductive TIMs, the inorganic fillers with high thermal conductivity are generally composited with polymers. For this purpose, some key technologies are needed to improve the dispersibility of fillers to reduce interfacial thermal resistance and increase thermal conduction channels. This paper reviews recent progresses on effective methods for improving thermal conductivity, which mainly include filler functionalization and processing, filler hybridization and coating, filler orientation and network. After implementing these strategies, the interfacial interaction between fillers and polymers, the synergy effect of different fillers and the thermal conduction pathway inside the matrix can be highly improved, hence enhancing the thermal conductivity of TIMs. Graphic abstract
ISSN:0022-2461
1573-4803
DOI:10.1007/s10853-020-05279-x