Ionic wind could cool laptops

The whir of laptop fans could become a distant memory as researchers try to commercialize ionic wind cooling technology.

International chip-packaging company Tessera, along with the University of Washington, have demonstrated this system in a working laptop, according to MIT’s Technology Review. Commercialization could come as early as next year.

Ionic wind is not only quieter than an internal fan, it’s more efficient, extracting 30 percent more heat with possibly half as much power, lab tests show. Kind of like the difference between hard drives and solid state drives, an Ionic system would have no moving parts. Alexander Mamishev, a University of Washington professor who planted the original seeds of the research, called the latest development “a big milestone.”

The system would use pipes that evaporate and condense fluid to draw heat away from computing components. This heat would reach the ionic cooler itself, where voltage is applied to two electrodes, one that ionizes air and another that receives the ionized molecules. This creates momentum that pushes neutral air back to the hot components, creating, in essence, a cooling breeze inside the computer.

Researchers are working to bring the size of the system down to fit in laptops, game consoles, projectors and servers, but two other major obstacles remain. Reliability is a concern, because the current model corrodes faster than the 30,000-hour life of an average laptop. The researchers are also working on dust resistance, possibly using a prefilter to rival the dust intake levels of a fan.

One element that’s not mentioned here — probably because it’s too early to tell — is cost. I could see this kind of technology taking on an SSD-like stature, being offered in premium laptops for those who want a quieter, more energy-efficient computer. The rest of us may have to stick with tried-and-true components, even if they’re obnoxious.