Flow boiling heat transfer in micro-channel heat sinks under sub-atmospheric pressures

A closed-loop two-phase mini-channel-based heat sink driven by a micro-gear pump was developed in this work. Using water as an example, experiments were performed in two micro-channel heat sinks under the conditions of initial pressure of Pin = 34-113 kPa, mass velocity of G = 19-468 kg/m2s, outlet quality of xe,out =-14-66%, and heat flux of q″ = 0-230 W/cm², which covered single-phase flow, subcooled flow boiling, and saturated flow boiling regions. The results showed distinctive differences between the subcooled and saturated boiling regime and revealed that the influence of the system pressure. The experimental data were also compared to a boiling mechanism demarcation map and assessed against some empirical correlations, which suggests some uniqueness of the current heat sink associated with flow boiling at the mesoscale.