What approach are data centers increasingly using to keep these dense AI racks from overheating?

Liquid cooling that pipes coolant directly to the chips is increasingly used in dense AI server racks because liquid can absorb and carry away far more heat per unit volume than air can, which matters enormously as AI chips pack in more power-hungry processors than fans alone can keep from overheating.

Simply adding more fans to push colder air faster runs into physical limits, since air has a much lower heat capacity than liquid, and beyond a certain point more airflow can't compensate for how much heat modern AI racks generate. Spacing servers farther apart would reduce density and waste valuable data center floor space rather than actually solving the cooling problem.

Some of the most advanced setups now submerge entire servers directly in a special non-conductive cooling fluid, an approach called immersion cooling, which can handle even higher heat loads than piping coolant to individual chip cold plates.