Development of advanced thermal management materials & systems for low-temperature industrial equipment through the identification of thermal anomalies and improvement of thermal energy exchanges.

This RL aims at developing effective cooling solutions as well as non-intrusive and non-destructive thermal control and defects identification approaches in devices that produce low-temperature heat, thus improving their performances and the life-time. The main application fields are power electronics and batteries, mostly for renewables and electric vehicles. In all the cases, the R&D activity goes from materials development to systems prototyping at a relevant scale. Some of the most active topics are:

• Thermal management of batteries and electronic devices. The current trend towards increasing specific capacity and power of batteries for EV and of microelectronic devices makes currently used thermal management systems to become insufficient. Therefore, new cooling solutions have to be searched to warrant the safety, reliability, and long-life of the next generations of such systems. Microfluidic-based integrated solutions combined with PCMs are in the focus of the developments of this RL as a way to reach high heat dissipation power fulfilling general requirements of compactness, lightweight, and reliability. Additionally, liquid immersion technics, combined with intensified boiling innovative solutions, makes also part of the R&D activity of this RL.

• PCM-based thermal protection solutions. Thermal protection against the external environment is required in many industrial areas such as aeronautics and space, buildings, food, and textile industries, etc. PCM-based paintings, coatings, and composite materials are being developed within this RL to enable adequate thermal protection with accurate temperature control. This involves developing effective PCMs microencapsulation methods and integration solutions into different kinds of supporting media.