ABSTRACT
This chapter discusses all three modes of heat transfer—radiation, convection, and conduction. All three occur in the printed circuit board environment. The chapter highlights the general laws and relationships associated with heat transfer in microelectronic applications. Thermal considerations in the design of electronic packages are becoming increasingly important. The desire for greater speed and power in electronic devices has given rise to a continued increase in circuit densities and power dissipation in modern electronic packages. Two main fields of thermal science are applied to the design of electronic packages: thermal control and thermal analysis. Thermal control is the selection of heat transfer technology and equipment to meet specific thermal requirements in the design of the electronic package being considered. The aim of thermal analysis is to predict the temperatures and heat fluxes that will occur in an electronic assembly during field operation.
