Noncured Graphene Thermal Interface Materials for High-Power Electronics: Minimizing the Thermal Contact Resistance

We report on experimental investigation of thermal contact resistance, [Formula: see text] , of the noncuring graphene thermal interface materials with the surfaces characterized by different degree of roughness, [Formula: see text]. It is found that the thermal contact resistance depends on the graphene loading, [Formula: see text] , non-monotonically, achieving its minimum at the loading fraction of [Formula: see text]. Decreasing the surface roughness by [Formula: see text] results in approximately the factor of ×2 decrease in the thermal contact resistance for this graphene loading. The obtained dependences of the thermal conductivity, [Formula: see text] , thermal contact resistance, [Formula: see text] , and the total thermal resistance of the thermal interface material layer on [Formula: see text] and [Formula: see text] can be utilized for optimization of the loading fraction of graphene for specific materials and roughness of the connecting surfaces. Our results are important for the thermal management of high-power-density electronics implemented with diamond and other wide-band-gap semiconductors.