Due to the advantage of large latent heat and isothermal behavior during the phase change process
solid-liquid phase change material (PCM)can be well applied in the passive thermal design for thermal control unit (TCU)of portable electronic devices.However
PCM has a major drawback of low thermal conductivity
leading to low charging and discharging rates and bad TCU performance.Therefore
it is necessary to enhance the PCM conductivity to improve the TCU thermal performance.A two-dimension mathematical model of TCU filled with foam-PCM composite material (FCPCM)was presented
and numerical simulation was conducted to analyze the TCU thermal performance.The effect of void was considered in the numerical model for FCPCM heat transfer and equivalent capacity method was used to handle PCM phase change process.The thermal performance of TCU filled with FCPCM was compared to that with fins.Further
the effects of some important parameters on TCU thermal performance were investigated numerically
such as foam porosity
heat source power and foam matrix material.The results show that the FCPCM with aluminum matrix can greatly improve the TCU performance
and the design can provide a reliable solution to electronic thermal control.