Performance Improvements of Spray Cooled GaN Microwave Amplifiers

Mainstream Engineering Corporation has already demonstrated the value of integrating a saturated liquid spray cooling system with high power GaAs microwave amplifiers in phased array transmitters. Optimized cooling systems can increase reliability by anorder of magnitude, improve efficiency by 30%, and increase power by 30%. Mainstream will now demonstrate similar performance enhancements of GaN amplifiers being developed for x-band active aperture arrays. In Phase I a detailed thermal model will beexperimentally derived, performance tests on actual GaN chips will be conducted, and demonstration of a breadboard system will be completed. A Phase II Fast Track is planned and will be used to demonstrate and life test a complete wide bandgap amplifierpackage and thermal management system. There is an urgent need to develop advanced cooling methods that can be implemented into the thermal packaging of the next generation of military, aerospace, and commercial electronics. Mainstream has alreadydemonstrated saturated liquid spray cooling systems that are possible and practical. Commercial applications include satellites and super-computer chip modules.