ICT2014 Abstracts

The four maximum parameters on a thermoelectric cooler module were formulated on the basis of the hot junction temperature as they have been widely used in the commercial products.  Then, the effective material properties (α, ρ, and k) were newly defined in terms of the three maximum parameters (ΔT_max, I_max, and Q_max) out of  the  four parameters  (ΔT_max, I_max, Q_max, and V_max), so that the ideal equation with the effective material properties was able to predict the performance of thermoelectric cooler modules having freedom of design without being limited to the use of the module. The comparison between the prediction and four major  manufacturers’ performance curve data showed acceptable agreement for system design. Normalized parameters using the maximum parameters were developed to present the characteristics of the thermoelectric coolers and provided the normalized charts.  The normalized charts may be used to predict the realistic parameters by simply substituting the manufacturer’s maximum parameters for the maximum parameters in the normalized parameters.