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High power levels and high power densities associated with directed energy weapon systems, electronic warfare systems, and high thrust-to-weight aircraft propulsion systems require the development of effective and efficient thermal management solutions. As the objective for many high-power electronic systems is integration onto mobile platforms, strict requirements are also placed on the size, weight, and power draw of the corresponding thermal management system. High peak waste heat loads cannot be efficiently rejected to ambient air in a package integrated onto a mobile platform, leading to the need to store large amounts of energy in a compact, lightweight package. Thermal storage devices must not only be able to store energy rapidly at high power levels but they must also reject energy efficiently, allowing the thermal storage device to recharge for multiple uses.

Advances in aircraft technology have brought about a necessity for new aircraft thermal management architectures in order to maintain reasonable cost, size, weight, and power requirements of the overall thermal system. Two-phase cooling technologies such as vapor-compression systems have demonstrated significant benefits and offer a serious option for emerging new aircraft thermal management applications. Although vapor-compression technology offers a steady state solution to many of the limitations of existing aircraft thermal management systems, industry concerns about transient behavior need to be addressed. The purpose of this research was to investigate transient effects on the vapor compression system when the majority of the onboard thermal loads are cooled directly with the vapor-compression system and how these systems operate under the rapid thermal transients that a military aircraft experiences during combat missions.

Recent advances in aircraft technology have raised much concern over the manner in which aircraft thermal management is carried out. These advances range from the incorporation of high-power electronics to transporting thermal loads at high temperatures. These types of technological advances have brought about a necessity for new aircraft thermal management architectures in order to maintain reasonable cost, size, weight, and power requirements of the overall system. The objective of this study is to address the requirements and performance aspects of existing system configurations in an effort to identify inefficiencies and highlight potential areas for improvement. As a result of this study, a new aircraft thermal management architecture, which can best be described as a vapor-compression thermal bus, is proposed as a replacement for existing technology.