3-D Thermo-Electric Cooler Analysis for Laser Diode Module

摘要

In order to keep the laser diode (LD) temperature within a desired range, a thermo-electric cooler (TEC) is used. It is very helpful for package designers to obtain a tool that can predict the amount of electric power consumption of a TEC, as various phenomena related to material properties such as Young's modulus, thermal conductivity, and thermal expansion must be taken into consideration to build a package. We developed a 3-D numerical thermal simulation method in which TEC's physical properties of electrical resistance, thermal conductivity and Seebeck effect coefficient related to thermoelectromotive force are calibrated by experimental measurement. Introducing feedback control into the simulation, this method can estimate the TEC electric current, voltage, and power consumption, at +- 6%, +- 6%, and +- 10% precision, respectively compared to our measurement under the ambient temperature from 25°C to 55°C, and can also provide information about TEC's component material, i.e. AlN's 11% advantage of power consumption compared to Al_2O_3. Further, structure distortion analysis can be done with acquired temperature distribution of a package as a boundary condition.