Engineering alumni-faculty team publishes analysis on cold plate designs for esteemed publication

Engineering professors Mahdi Farahikia and Ping-Chuan Wang collaborated with alumni Louis Reyes ’23 (Mechanical Engineering) and Matthew Krumholtz ’23 (Mechanical Engineering) before their graduation on a cost-benefit analysis examining internal structures in cold plates used in cooling down electronic devices, and now their study is available in one of their field’s most well-regarded academic journals. 

“A Comparative Numerical Analysis of Cold Plates for Thermal Management of Chips With Hotspots” is featured in the American Society of Mechanical Engineering’s Journal of Electronic Packaging’s September 2024 issue.  

Using computer models, the team designed an analysis of cold plate designs in technologies such as gaming computers and data centers to determine which designs are most efficient and cost-effective.  

“With the increasing demand for high-performance computing, thermal management of electronic devices has met significant challenges,” the authors said. “The temperatures of the chips reach extremely high levels in a very short time. The high and nonuniform temperatures adversely affect the reliability and lifespan of the microchips.”  

This is one of several collaborative studies Wang and Farahikia have taken on with Engineering students since joining the SUNY New Paltz faculty. Each project offers in-depth studies of thermal management of digital devices, and how they can be made more efficient in everyday use. 

Click here to learn more about SUNY New Paltz’s Division of Engineering Programs.