3D Woven Lattices as Multi-functional Heat Exchanger

Unmet Need
Porous materials are a widely used heat exchanger for common household items such as radiators and refrigerators. However, these materials are typically focused on optimizing at most one or two physical/chemical properties (heat transfer, fluidic permeability, electrical conductivity, etc.). As a result, these materials tend to underperform in applications that require numerous properties optimized in a multidirectional fashion. The design of these materials is typically iterative in nature, making them time consuming and expensive to fabricate.

Technology Overview
The proposed technology is a set of 3D woven lattices that topologically optimize multiple chemical/physical properties simultaneously. These 3D woven lattices have well defined unit cell geometries that can optimize multiple variables simultaneously while maintaining a high mechanical stiffness and permeability. This allows the porous material to be used in additional applications, and fixes the time consuming and expensive design of many porous materials used today.

Stage of Development
A working prototype has been produced and detailed in published papers

Publications
Longyu Zhao, Stephen M. Ryan, Sen Lin, Ju Xue, Seunghyun Ha, Takeru Igusa, Keith W. Sharp, James K. Guest, Kevin J. Hemker, Timothy P. Weihs. “Combining a distributed flow manifold and 3D woven metallic lattices to enhance fluidic and thermal properties for heat transfer applications”, International Journal of Heat and Mass Transfer 108 (2017) 2169-2180.

Amanda J. Levinson, David J. Rowenhorst, Keith W. Sharp, Stephen M. Ryan, Kevin J. Hemker, Richard W. Fonda. "Automated methods for the quantification of 3D woven architectures", Materials Characterization 124 (2017) 241–249.

L Zhao, SM Ryan, JK Ortega, S Ha, KW Sharp, JK Guest, KJ Hemker, “Experimental investigation of 3D woven Cu lattices for heat exchanger applications”, Int. J. of Heat and Mass Transfer 96 (2016) 296-311.

Yong Zhang, Seunghyun Ha, Keith Sharp, James K Guest, TP Weihs, and Kevin J Hemker, “Fabrication and mechanical characterization of 3D woven Cu lattice materials”, Materials & Design 85 (2015) 743-751.

Stephen M. Ryan, Stefan Szyniszewski, Seunghyun Ha, Keith W. Sharp, Timothy P. Weihs, James K. Guest, and Kevin J. Hemker, “Damping Behavior of 3D Woven Metallic Lattice Materials”, Scripta Materialia 106 (2015) 1-4.

L Zhao, S Ha, KW Sharp, AB Geltmacher, RW Fonda, AH Kinsey, Y Zhang, SM Ryan, D Erdeniz, DC Dunand, KJ Hemker, JK Guest, TP Weihs, “Permeability measurements and modeling of topology-optimized metallic 3D woven lattices”, Acta Materialia 81 (2014) 326-336.

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