Piezoelectric Actuator를 이용한 열전냉각장치의 냉각성능 고찰

Abstract

Thermoelectric (Peltier) technology has experienced a major advance in recent years, basically due to the development of semiconductors and the incorporation of the thermoelectric devices into the civil market. As a result of environmental problems produced by CFC gas, the development of equipment based on this technology has been fostered. Nowadays thermoelectric refrigeration has a place in medical applications, scientific equipment and in other devices where a high precision temperature control is essential. An increasing number of experimental and numerical studies have been performed on the thermoelectric module and the thermoelectric cooling devices to improve the cooling performance of the thermoelectric cooling devices using thermoelectric module. Accordingly, the objective of this study was to improve the cooling performance of the thermoelectric cooling devices using the piezoelectric actuators. So, the temperature distribution of cold region between cold side of the thermoelectric cooling devices and the piezoelectric actuator was measured with and without the piezoelectric actuators during the cooling process using the thermoelectric cooling devices. The results of measured temperature distribution with the piezoelectric actuators were compared with one without the piezoelectric actuators. Also, this study focused on the visualization of thermo-flow phenomenon of cold region to thermoelectric cooling device using thermoelectric module when the piezoelectric actuators is used. A prototype of a miniature thermoelectric cooling device using the piezoelectric actuators was proposed and constructed. The flow visualization of thermoelectric cooling device using He-Ne laser and CCD camera was experimentally investigated. The result of experiment shows acoustic streaming is one of the prime effects when vibrating piezoelectric actuators were applied. Besides, the enhanced cooling performance can be attributed to the generation of acoustic streaming by the vibration of piezoelectric actuator which was captured in the flow visualization experiments.