Surface waves can help nanostructured devices keep their
cool

Due to the continuing progress in miniaturization of
silicon microelectronic and photonic devices, the cooling of device
structures is increasingly challenging. Conventional heat transport
in bulk materials is dominated by acoustic phonons, which are
quasiparticles that represent the material’s lattice vibrations,
similar to the way that photons represent light waves.
Unfortunately, this type of cooling is reaching its limits in these
tiny structures.