Thermal mangement article having thermal wave guide

• US 7,742,673 B2
• Filed: 09/28/2007
• Issued: 06/22/2010
• Est. Priority Date: 09/28/2007
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: General Electric Company
• Original Assignee: General Electric Company
• Inventors: Li, Yun, Xia, Hua, Hershey, John Erik, Zhang, Jian, Grabb, Mark Lewis
• Primary Examiner(s): WONG, TINA MEI SENG
• Application Number:
  US11/863,690
• Publication Number:
  US 20090085454A1
• Time in Patent Office: 998 Days
• Field of Search: None
• US Class Current: 385/129
• CPC Class Codes: H01L 27/1225 with semiconductor materials not belonging to the group IV of the periodic table, e.g. InGaZnO
• CPC Class Codes: H01L 29/7869 having a semiconductor body comprising an oxide semiconductor material, e.g. zinc oxide, copper aluminium oxide, cadmium stannate
• CPC Class Codes: H10K 50/87 Arrangements for heating or cooling
• CPC Class Codes: H10K 59/32 Stacked devices having two or more layers, each emitting at different wavelengths
• CPC Class Codes: H10K 59/38 comprising colour filters or colour changing media [CCM]
• CPC Class Codes: H10K 59/50 OLEDs integrated with light modulating elements, e.g. with electrochromic elements, photochromic elements or liquid crystal elements
• CPC Class Codes: H10K 59/8794 Arrangements for heating and cooling
• CPC Class Codes: Y10T 428/249953 Composite having voids in a component [e.g., porous, cellular, etc.]

Abstract

An article includes a stack of display layers including a display layer having a high-shear modulus that is sandwiched between two display layers having a low-shear modulus. The display layers include a light-emitting device that generates heat and light during use. The heat generated by the display layers may form localized heat-sources in the stack. The display layer with the high-shear modulus is a thermal transport layer through which the localized heat-sources-induced guided elastic waves propagate along an acoustic waveguide plane and can transport the heat generated by the light-emitting device away from the light-emitting device. Alternately, a display layer having a high refractive index may be sandwiched between two display layers having a low refractive index. The display layers with low shear modulus or low refractive index may be replaced with thermal transport layers having low shear modulus or low refractive index respectively.

Claims

1. An article, comprising:

a stack of display layers, the stack comprising a display layer having a relatively high-shear modulus sandwiched between two display layers having a relatively low-shear modulus, and each display layer comprising a light-emitting device that generates heat and light during use;

the heat generated by the display layers forming a localized heat-source within the stack; and

the display layer with the relatively high-shear modulus is a thermal transport layer through which the localized heat-source-induced elastic waves propagate along an acoustic waveguide plane, and the thermal transport layer can transport the heat generated by the light-emitting device away from the light-emitting device.

2. The article defined in claim 1, wherein the guided or transported elastic waves are bulk elastic waves.

3. The article defined in claim 1, wherein the guided or transported elastic waves are Lamb and Love plate elastic waves.

4. The article defined in claim 1, wherein the thermal transport layer transports heat generated in the localized heat-sources in the display layer away from the display layer by lattice vibration associated with the guided elastic wave propagating through the thermal transport layer.

5. The article as defined claim 1, wherein a portion of the thermal transport layer provides thermal dissipation of heat either by electronic transportation or lattice vibration associated with elastic wave propagation in the thermal transport layer.

6. The article as defined in claim 5, wherein the thickness of the portion of the thermal transport layer that provides thermal dissipation is less than the remaining thickness of the thermal transport layer, and the thickness differential is sufficient to enhance the heat dissipation performance of the long-wavelength electromagnetic waves by adjacent highly reflective interfaces.

7. The article defined in claim 1, wherein the thermal transport layer further comprises a tunable absorber at a peripheral edge of the thermal transport layer to reduce or eliminate reflection of the elastic waves.

8. The article defined in claim 7, wherein the absorber is a thermoelectric edge layer with a modulus controlled and tuned by a variable electric potential.

9. The article as defined in claim 1, wherein the light-emitting device is an inorganic light-emitting device or a light-emitting nano-wire device.

10. The article as defined in claim 1, wherein the light-emitting device is an organic light-emitting device.

11. The article as defined in claim 1, wherein the thermal transport layer has a thickness in a range of from about 0.1 micrometer to about 1000 micrometers.

12. The article as defined in claim 1, wherein the thermal transport layer has a flexural strength in a range of from about 10 gigaPascal to about 400 gigaPascal based on the type of material used to fabricate the thermal transport layer.

13. The article as defined in claim 1, wherein the thermal transport layer has a thickness that is greater in a first zone of the display that generates relatively more heat than in another zone of the display that generates relatively less heat.

14. The article as defined in claim 13, wherein the first zone of the display in the middle of the stack.

15. The article as defined in claim 1, wherein a back display layer relative to a viewer of the display generates relatively more heat than a front display layer or layers has a thermal transport layer with a higher thermal removal efficiency than a thermal efficiency of a thermal transport layer or layers that are secured to corresponding ones of the front display layers.

16. The article as defined in claim 1, wherein the thermal transport layer has a refractive index and the display layer has a refractive index and the refractive index differential between the thermal transport layer and the display layer is less than about 0.1.

17. The article as defined in claim 1, wherein the thermal transport layer has a refractive index and the display layer has a refractive index and the refractive index of the thermal transport layer is equal to the refractive index of the display layer.

18. The article as defined in claim 1, wherein there is a plurality of heat dissipating structures around the peripheral edge of the display layer in thermal communication with both the thermal transport layers and the display layers.

19. The article as defined in claim 18, wherein the heat dissipating structure comprises a synthetic jet, a heat exchanger, a heat spreader, a heat sink, a radiator, one or more Peltier devices, air cooling, or a heat dissipation pipe.

20. The article as defined in claim 18, wherein the heat dissipating structure is in thermal communication with the thermal transport layer and with a heat absorbing structure placed at a distance from the display layer.

21. The article as defined in claim 20, wherein the thermal transport layer is in thermal communication with the heat absorbing structure via a non-transparent highly thermally conductive material such as metalized sheets, conductive glass coating, and porous structural carbon films.

22. The article as defined in claim 1, wherein the stack is a three-dimensional display stack.

23. The article as defined in claim 22, wherein there is at least two thermal transport layers for every one display layer of the stack.

24. The article as defined in claim 1, wherein the display layer further comprises a reversibly opacifying layer.

25. The article as defined in claim 24, wherein the opacifying layer responds to an electrical signal by switching to or from a light transmissive state from or to a light blocking or light absorbing state.

26. The article as defined in claim 24, wherein the opacifying layer is disposed on a surface of the display layer opposite to a surface of the display layer that emits light.

27. An article, comprising:

a stack of display layers including a display layer having high refractive index is sandwiched between two display layers having low refractive index, the display layers comprising a light-emitting device that generates heat and light during use;

the heat generated by the display layers forming localized heat-sources in the stack; and

wherein the display layer with the high refractive index is a thermal transport layer through which the localized heat-sources-induced electromagnetic waves propagate along an optical waveguide plane and can transport the heat generated by the light-emitting device away from the light-emitting device.

28. The article as defined claim 27, wherein the optical waveguide transports heat generated in the localized heat-sources in the thermal transport layer away from the display layer by guide optical waves associated with electromagnetic waves propagation in the display layers.

29. The article as defined in claim 27, wherein a portion of the thermal transport layer provides thermal dissipation of heat either by electronic transportation or lattice vibration associated guided elastic wave propagation in the display layers.

30. An article, comprising:

a stack of display layers including

a thermal transport layer having a high-shear modulus sandwiched between two display layers having a low-shear modulus, the display layers comprising a light-emitting device that generates heat and light during use;

the heat generated by the display layers forming localized heat-sources in the stack and diffused into the thermal transport layers; and

wherein the diffused heat-sources-induced guided elastic waves propagate along an acoustic waveguide plane in the thermal transport layer by lattice vibration or thermal excited elastic waves from a localized heat-source to an external heat sink;

or

a thermal transport layer having a high refractive index sandwiched between two display layers having a low refractive index, the display layers comprising a light-emitting device that generates heat and light during use;

the heat generated by the display layers forming localized heat-sources in the stack and diffused into the thermal transport layers; and

wherein the diffused heat-sources-induced guided electromagnetic waves and guide elastic waves propagate along an acoustic and optical waveguide plane in the thermal transport layer from the localized heat-source to an external heat sink;

or

a thermal transport layer having an integration of a transparent metal oxide layer and sub-nanometer thick metal coating layer sandwiched between two display layers with a low-shear modulus that can transport heat generated by localized heat-sources in the light-emitting device in the display layer, by electronic transportation and lattice vibration from a localized heat-source to an external heat sink.