IBM's Zurich Research Laboratory demonstrated three-dimensional chip stacks that are cooled with water, which the company expects to commercialize for its multicore servers. By stacking memory chips between processor cores they can multiply interconnections by 100 times while reducing their feature size tenfold. To cool the stack at a rate of 180 watts per layer, water flows down 50-micron channels between the stacked chips. Earlier this year, the same group described the water cooling method for IBM's Hydro-Cluster supercomputer. The Zurich team predicts high-end IBM multicore computers will migrate from the copper-plate water-cooling-method to the 3-D chip-stack in five to 10 years.
Text: http://www.eetimes.com/showArticle.jhtml?articleID=208402316
