Lancaster, Pennsylvania – October 8, 2007 – Advanced Cooling Technologies, Inc. (ACT) has developed a new precision temperature control technology for optical systems, lasers, and detectors that require tight temperature control to the milli-Kelvin level.
ACT’s Pressure Controlled Heat Pipe (PCHP) improves on the performance of a Variable Conductance Heat Pipe (VCHP) by providing very tight control – to the milli-Kelvin level – without the excessively large reservoir of a VCHP or the power consumption of trim heaters and cold biasing. It offers faster transient response than a heated-reservoir VCHP and the ability to change the set point during operation to compensate for uncertainties in the performance of other components in the system. The following figures show the measured heat pipe temperatures at varying heat load and sink temperature conditions. As seen, the PCHP was able to maintain the heat pipe temperature within ±0.1K with a five time heat load increase and large sink temperature swings.
This new PCHP technology is an improved product based on ACT’s existing Isothermal Furnace Liner (IFL), Pressure Controlled Heat Pipe (PCHP) Furnace and Heat Pipe Blackbody Cavity (HPBC) products. These products are designed to operate in a wide temperature range from -60°C to 1,100°C by using different working fluids including ammonia, methanol, water, cesium, potassium, sodium and lithium.