Temperature controlled apparatus

Claim 1

A temperature-controlled apparatus for cooling, according to demand, a heat-sensitive device having two major surfaces thereon comprising: a heat-sinking substrate having a substrate contact area of a fixed shape and size on the contact side thereof which is in thermal and physical contact with one of the major surfaces, the thermal resistance through the substrate contact area decreasing with increasing contact pressure between the device and the substrate; a heat-conductive disk having a disk contact area on one side thereof which is in thermal and physical contact with the other major surface; a source of an evaporatable liquid in thermal contact with the other side of the disk and whose vapor pressure increases with the temperature of the liquid; the heat from the device substantially instantaneously heating up the disk through heat conduction across tthe disk contact area to thereby evaporate the liquid and also increase the liquid vapor pressure on the other side of the disk; a gas-tight and substantially rigid enclosure means enclosing at least the disk and part of the contact side of the substrate to allow the build-up of the vapor pressure of the liquid within the enclosure means; means for preventing the vapor pressure from being applied to the one side of the disk which is in contact with the device; the other side of the disk subjected to the liquid vapor pressure thereon being substantially greater than the substrate contact area contacting the device so that to balance the forces on the two sides of the disk the unit contact pressure between the device and the substrate must also be substantially greater than the liquid vapor pressure on the other side of the disk whereby increasing temperature on the device heats up the disk and the liquid to increase the vapor pressure on the other side of the disk and, simultaneously, to increase the contact pressure between the device and the substrate and thus to decrease the thermal resistance thereby allowing more effective heat removal from the device via heat conduction through the substrate at a time when more cooling of the device is needed, without constantly applying unnecessarily high and damaging pressure on the device.