- Small bubbles can significantly reduce cooling requirements in AI facilities
- Scientists adapted nuclear reactor science to modern computing infrastructure
- Ferveret claims 15% efficiency gains over existing liquid cooling
Artificial intelligence is driving a rapid expansion of computing infrastructure and creating new concerns about power consumption and long-term sustainability.
Industry estimates suggest that data centers could account for between 9% and 17% of total US electricity consumption by the end of this decade.
About a third of that power currently goes to cooling the processors running AI tools and other demanding workloads.
Nuclear reactor principles find a new role in data center cooling
Now startup Ferveret believes a technology adapted from nuclear reactor research could significantly reduce the energy required to cool modern computer systems.
Founded by former MIT postdoctoral researcher Reza Azizian and MIT professor Matteo Bucci, the company developed a cooling approach called Adaptive Phase Cooling, or APC.
Instead of relying on traditional fans, the system immerses servers in a specialized liquid that removes heat more efficiently than air.
The characteristic involves the formation of very small bubbles on chip surfaces during operation.
According to the founders, these bubbles separate more frequently and condense quickly in the surrounding liquid, accelerating heat removal.
Ferveret adapted the concept from a nuclear engineering process known as subcooled boiling, which has been extensively studied to improve heat transfer efficiency inside reactors.
Air cooling is associated with noise, bulk, and inefficiency—three things Azizian decided he didn’t want to do when he walked into his first data center in 2017.
“I thought, ‘holy crap, that’s not how you cool facilities,'” he recalled, noting that air cooling alone can consume as much as 40% of a data center’s total power supply.
“It wasn’t an efficient way of doing things, but since it didn’t hurt performance, nobody cared that the cooling technology was 50 years old.”
The company says its fluid does not contain PFAS chemicals, often associated with certain advanced refrigeration technologies.
Ferveret also delivers its APC platform through compact modular units, where each enclosure is designed to house a single server.
According to Azizian, “physics allows us to get to form factors that weren’t possible before.”
Efficiency gains can ease pressure on growing AI infrastructure
Ferveret recently collaborated with researchers from the University of California, Los Angeles, to evaluate the performance of its technology.
According to the company, the APC approach provided a 15% improvement in computational power efficiency compared to leading liquid cooling alternatives.
Ferveret further claims that the combination of APC with its control software enables operators to generate 35% more tokens from AI workloads using the same power supply.
The company also provides racks, cooling distribution equipment, sensors and monitoring software that continuously adjusts operating conditions.
Bucci explained that the software analyzes temperature and pressure measurements in real time to reduce unnecessary energy consumption.
“Liquid is a better heat transfer medium than air. That’s why when you stick your hand in room temperature water, it still feels cold,” explains Bucci.
“When liquid boils, it becomes even better at removing heat because the phase change requires a lot of energy, which is the energy you remove from the chip…”
The founders claim that lower power requirements and zero water consumption could make new facilities practical in regions where electricity and cooling resources remain limited.
This option could prove important for parts of Africa, the Middle East, and the United States, where solar energy is abundant while water availability remains limited.
Ferveret is currently testing his technology with organizations including CleanSpark, FuriosaAI and Switch, while also participating in Nvidia’s Inception startup program.
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