The 2025 issue of Rice Engineering and Computing Magazine is here!
In our 50th anniversary issue, we celebrate the deep and growing connection between engineering and computing. From our early breakthroughs in high-performance computing to today’s advances in AI and data science, Rice has long been at the forefront of computing innovation. This edition highlights some of the people, ideas, and investments shaping what’s next.
Diamond Owl Structure Offers New Ways to Cool Electronics
A keepsake in a Rice University lab has helped inspire a new approach to one of electronics’ most persistent challenges: overheating.
Researchers in the lab of Pulickel Ajayan, Benjamin M. and Mary Greenwood Anderson Professor of Engineering, created a tiny owl made of diamond as a gift for distinguished guests. In the process, they refined a technique for growing precisely patterned diamond structures — an advance that could help electronic devices run cooler and more efficiently.
Today’s high-power technologies — from transistors used in radar and 5G devices to the processors supporting artificial intelligence — generate enormous amounts of heat. Diamond conducts heat better than many other materials, making it ideal for drawing heat away from hot spots in electronic devices. But its hardness and chemical resistance make it difficult to shape.
Instead of carving patterns into diamond — a slow process that can damage the material — the Rice team developed a “bottom-up” approach that forms the patterns as the diamond grows. In a plasma-based process, carbon-rich gases break apart and carbon atoms settle on a surface, assembling into diamond crystals. By placing tiny diamond “seed” points exactly where cooling structures are needed, the researchers can control where the diamond grows and how it forms. This approach allows patterned diamond features to be integrated directly onto materials commonly used in electronics.
The team demonstrated the technique on common electronic materials including silicon and gallium nitride and found the patterned diamond structures could reduce device temperatures by about 23 degrees Celsius.
“The main takeaway is that we have found a scalable, effective way to integrate diamond cooling into electronics,” said Ajayan, whose group has long studied diamond-based materials. “This matters because heat is what limits the battery life of your phone and the speed of your computer. By using diamond to cool these devices more efficiently, we can pave the way for faster, more reliable and longer-lasting technology.”