Valve controlled, node-level vapor condensation for two-phase heat sink(s)

A cooling apparatus comprising:

• at least one heat sink to cool at least one electronic component of an electronic subsystem of multiple electronic subsystems of an electronics rack, the at least one heat sink comprising at least one coolant-carrying channel for coolant to flow therethrough, the coolant providing two-phase cooling to the at least one electronic component, and being discharged from the at least one heat sink as coolant exhaust with coolant vapor;
• a node-level condensation module disposed within the electronic subsystem comprising the at least one electronic component, the node-level condensation module being coupled in fluid communication with the at least one heat sink and receiving the coolant exhaust therefrom, the node-level condensation module being liquid-cooled to facilitate condensing the coolant vapor in the received coolant exhaust within the electronic subsystem before return to a rack-level coolant return manifold of the electronics rack;
• a controller automatically controlling at least one of the liquid-cooling of the at least one heat sink or the liquid-cooling of the node-level condensation module;
• and
• wherein one heat sink of the at least one heat sink comprises:
• a thermally conductive structure comprising at least one coolant-carrying channel;
• and
• a membrane structure associated with the at least one coolant-carrying channel, the membrane structure comprising at least one vapor-permeable region, at least a portion of the at least one vapor-permeable region overlying a portion of the at least one coolant-carrying channel and facilitating removal of vapor from the at least one coolant-carrying channel, and the membrane structure further comprising at least one orifice coupled to inject coolant onto at least one surface of the at least one coolant-carrying channel intermediate ends of the at least one coolant-carrying channel.

A cooled electronics apparatus comprising:

• an electronics rack comprising multiple electronic subsystems, one electronic subsystem of the multiple electronic subsystems comprising at least one heat-generating electronic component to be cooled;
• and
• a cooling apparatus for cooling the at least one heat-generating electronic component, the cooling apparatus comprising:
• at least one heat sink coupled to at least one heat-generating electronic component, the at least one heat sink comprising at least one coolant-carrying channel for coolant to flow therethrough, the coolant providing two-phase cooling to the at least one electronic component and being discharged from the at least one heat sink as coolant exhaust with coolant vapor;
• a node-level condensation module disposed within the electronic subsystem comprising the at least one heat-generating electronic component, the node-level condensation module being coupled in fluid communication with the at least one heat sink and receiving the coolant exhaust therefrom, the node-level condensation module being liquid-cooled to facilitate condensing the coolant vapor in the received coolant exhaust within the electronic subsystem before return to a rack-level coolant return manifold of the electronics rack;
• a controller automatically controlling at least one of the liquid-cooling of the at least one heat sink or the liquid-cooling of the node-level condensation module;
• wherein each electronic subsystem comprises at least one electronic component to be cooled, and wherein the cooling apparatus comprises multiple heat sinks, each heat sink being associated with at least one electronic component of a respective electronic subsystem of the electronics rack, and wherein the cooling apparatus further comprises multiple node-level condensation modules, each node-level condensation module being disposed within a respective electronic subsystem of the multiple electronic subsystems, and being coupled to the rack-level coolant return manifold, the multiple node-level condensation modules providing the coolant exhaust as single-phase coolant to the rack-level coolant return manifold;
• multiple control valves directing coolant flow to the multiple heat sinks and the multiple node-level condensation modules for liquid-cooling thereof, and wherein one control valve of the multiple control valves is automatically controlled by the controller based on a temperature associated with the at least one electronic component of the respective electronic subsystem;
• and
• wherein the one control valve divides liquid coolant flow received at the respective electronic subsystem from a rack-level coolant supply manifold of the electronics rack between the at least one heat sink and the respective node-level condensation module, the control valve being automatically controlled by the controller to automatically adjust a fraction of received coolant flow to the at least one heat sink based on the at least one temperature associated with the at least one electronic component.