Fabrication and Characteristics of Ring Type Valveless Piezoelectric Micro-Pump using Peristaltic Motion

Abstract

The operation principle of travelling wave rotary type ultrasonic motor can be applied to fluid transfer mechanism of micro-pump successfully. In this paper, we propose a novel type valveless micro-pump that uses extensional vibration mode of travelling wave as a volume transporting means. The proposed pump consists of coaxial cylindrical shells that joined piezoelectric ceramic ring and metal body respectively. In accordance with the variation of the pump body dimension, we analyzed the vibration displacement characteristics of pump model, determined the optimal design condition, fabricated the prototype pump from the analysis results and evaluated its performance. The maximum flow rate was about 530 μl/min and the highest back pressure was 0.83 kPa at 120V_rms, 35 kHz input voltage.

Keywords:

• Piezoelectric micro-pump
• valveless pump
• extensional vibration mode
• peristaltic motion

Acknowledgments

This research was supported by Basic Science Research Program through the National Research Foundation of Korea (NRF) funded by the Ministry of Education, Science and Technology (KRF-2008-313-D00376).