Measuring Plant Metabolism:
A university-based agriculture research laboratory in Spain is measuring plant metabolism under various conditions. TECA Corporation’s high-capacity version of the AHP-1200CPV (please refer to part number 9-35KB-1-0A0 on our product specification sheet) is used to cool the plant to 22 °C. Precise temperature control is important in this application as the plant’s roots must not get too cold.
There is a significant heat load to deal with as well: the plant is being illuminated with LED lights. Finally, thermal contact is an issue. The plant is inside a glass container, which is inside an aluminum block, which is placed on the AHP-1200CPV Cold Plate surface. Working closely with TECA engineers, the customer was successfully able to integrate the AHP-1200CPV Cold Plate into this unique experiment design and his sensitive thermal management needs were met.
The customer shared with us: “Your suggestion to add water between the glass and the aluminum block is a good one. It does lower the temperature inside, probably by increasing the thermal contact. The fit between the block and the glass is pretty tight. The glass was made first and then the block was drilled out using the glass as a reference. Still, even a tiny space basically ruins the heat transfer, so adding the water seems to fix that. Thanks for your help and suggestions, they were quite useful.”