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200 points rbanffy | 2 comments | | HN request time: 0.507s | source
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pfdietz ◴[] No.45655955[source]
The article and paper don't mention it, but the thermal conductivity of single crystal diamond can be increased another 50% at room temperature by using pure carbon-12. The isotopic uniformity reduces scattering of phonons, which are what transports heat energy in diamond. For a very thin film like this the cost of using isotopically purified carbon shouldn't be that bad.

BTW, the thermal conductivity of C-12 diamond at cryogenic temperature is even higher, reaching something like 41000 W/m K at 104 K.

Isotopically purified silicon has also been considered due to its higher thermal conductivity, but the effect there at room temperature is not nearly as dramatic.

Weirdly, I read UV damage in C-12 diamond is reduced by a factor of 10 vs. natural diamond, I understand because this damage process is mediated by phonons. No relevance to the chip use case (unless UV damage in photolithography could be important?), but I found it interesting.

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1. modeless ◴[] No.45656353[source]
This is polycrystalline diamond, which probably scatters phonons anyway, so it seems naively like using a single isotope wouldn't help much. But that's definitely an interesting fact and I think you're right that it probably wouldn't add much expense when the amount of material is so small.
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2. pfdietz ◴[] No.45669996[source]
I'm not sure that's too dominant? The thermal conductivity reported is close to the natural diamond, so increasing the conductivity of the individual microcrystals could still be significant.