Frost in 20 seconds: can this supercooling tech give China an edge in AI race?

Chinese scientists have unveiled a cooling technology that can plunge a liquid cooling medium from room temperature to sub-zero levels in less than half a minute. This leap in thermal engineering offered a promising heat management solution for energy-hungry data centres that were mushrooming across China and the United States, they said. By harnessing the unique behaviour of ammonium thiocyanate in water under pressure, the team created a liquid cooling system that mimics squeezing a “wet sponge” – when releasing pressure, it triggers rapid redissolution of salt, absorbing massive amounts of heat almost instantly. In experiments, a saturated solution cooled by 30 degrees Celsius (54 Fahrenheit) within seconds at room temperature, and in hotter environments, the drop exceeded 50 degrees. This ultra-fast, high-capacity cooling cycle could transform how artificial intelligence (AI) infrastructure manages heat. With a theoretical efficiency approaching 80 per cent, far surpassing conventional refrigeration, and with zero reliance on harmful fluorocarbon gases, the technology promises not only blistering performance but also a greener path forward for data centres powering the AI revolution. Published on January 22 in the journal Nature, the research was conducted by a team including Li Bing from the Chinese Academy of Sciences’ Institute of Metal Research, Li Kuo from the Centre for High Pressure Science & Technology Advanced Research and others. As computing power becomes critical infrastructure in the US-China AI race, its rapid growth comes with soaring energy consumption and cooling demands. In 2024, US commercial electricity use grew by 11 per cent, a rise largely attributed to a 90 per cent year-on-year increase in data centres. OpenAI CEO Sam Altman highlighted this scale during a trip to Texas last year, noting that his research laboratory began 2025 “with around 230 megawatts of capacity and is now on track to exit 2025 north of 2GW of operational capacity”. While China already has twice the power generation capacity of the United States, it is also advancing new technologies for building more energy efficient data centres. In 2019, Li Bing discovered that certain solid materials, known as plastic crystals, could absorb or release heat in response to pressure changes. In this latest work, he and his team have extended this phenomenon to liquid solutions, naming it the “barocaloric effect at dissolution”. While studying a type of salt called ammonium thiocyanate, the team observed its dissolution in water absorbed a significant amount of heat. This led to research that revealed the solution exhibits a remarkable thermal effect under pressure. The traditional “barocaloric effect” is like squeezing a dry sponge: compression generates heat as the structure tightens, while releasing pressure cools it as it expands. However, this method offers limited cooling capacity, and solid materials transfer heat slowly. In contrast, the barocaloric effect at dissolution is like squeezing a wet sponge soaked in saltwater. Applying pressure causes the salt to precipitate out, releasing heat. Releasing the pressure allows the salt to rapidly redissolve, quickly absorbing a large amount of heat from the surroundings. At room temperature, a saturated ammonium thiocyanate solution can cool by 30 degrees within 20 seconds after pressure release. In higher ambient temperatures, the temperature drop can exceed 50 degrees, showing exceptional cooling efficiency that surpasses existing materials. Based on this phenomenon, the team designed a four-step cooling cycle: pressurising the solution to heat it, dissipating that heat to the environment via flow, depressurising to trigger intense cooling and finally pumping the chilled solution to absorb heat from equipment. In a single cycle, each gram of the working fluid can absorb up to 67 joules of heat, with a theoretical efficiency as high as 77 per cent. This compares favourably to the typical 50 per cent efficiency of standard home refrigerator compressors. “Cooling systems currently account for nearly 40 per cent of a data centre’s total electricity consumption. This finding could provide a more efficient cooling solution for these high-energy-consumption facilities,” state broadcaster CCTV reported on January 23. Beyond higher efficiency and lower energy use, the fluid inherently enables efficient heat transfer through flow. Compared to widely used gas-compression refrigeration, this method eliminates the need for harmful fluorocarbon refrigerants with high global warming potential, significantly reducing environmental impact. “[The research] integrates large cooling capacity, efficient heat transfer, and low carbon emissions,” Li Bing said in the paper. CCTV’s report noted that this research offered a new pathway for cooling technologies in next-generation data centres and high-performance computing chips.

Frost in 20 seconds: can this supercooling tech give China an edge in AI race?

.css-1c6uqr6{color:inherit;font-weight:inherit;font-size:inherit;font-family:inherit;line-height:inherit;overflow-wrap:break-word;}Liquid cooling system powered by science could fuel critical infrastructure, offsetting soaring energy consumption and cooling demands

Liquid cooling system powered by science could fuel critical infrastructure, offsetting soaring energy consumption and cooling demands