Thermosyphon cooling modules, to cool multichip modules (MCMs), were designed and tested. The cooling module consists of a cold plate with micro nned channels and a plate-type integrated condenser. A separate ow model was employed to predict the mass ux and the pressure drop in the channel of the cold plate. The local and average convective boiling heat transfer coef cients and the corresponding wall superheat were calculated using the Chen's correlation. Experiments were performed to nd out how the thermal performance of the cooling module was affected by the condenser size and the amount of charging uid. Great emphasis was placed on the transient characteristics of the cooling module. For an allowable temperature rise of 58°C on the surface of the heater, the cooling module can handle a heat ux of as much as 2.5 W/cm 2 . No boiling retardation was observed inside the cold plate, which resulted in smooth transition from the transient state to the steady one. It was also found that the appropriate size of the condenser and the adequate amount of charging liquid are crucial factors affecting the performance of a closed two-phase thermosyphon device.Switching systems in a broadband integrated services digital network (B-ISDN) will use the asynchronous transfer mode (ATM) and will have a throughput on the order of terabits per second. Correspondingly, the heat ux in a B-ISDN is one or two orders of magnitude higher than in conventional systems, and will reach 1-2 W/cm 2 , which will necessitate new packaging systems and ingenious cooling technology [1,2]. The multichip module (MCM) has been considered [3] an appropriate packaging design for B-ISDNs because its high packaging density will decrease signal propagation delay and reduce electromagnetic emission.The direct immersion cooling module [4] has been considered a promising method for such application because it removes a large amount of heat effectively. However, application of such a cooling method to communication systems is not an easy task because of dif culties in maintenance and reliability. As an alternative, ingeneous air-cooled thermosyphon modules [5,6] and indirect liquid-cooling thermosyphons [7,8] have been proposed for cooling high-density electronic packaging. However, it has been observed [9] that the 29