Title :
A Novel Application of Ferrofluid Actuation with PDMS Microchannel
Author :
Chang, Yaw-Jen ; Hu, Chih-Yu ; Lin, Chu-Hsuan
Author_Institution :
Dept. of Mech. Eng., Chung Yuan Christian Univ., Chungli, Taiwan
Abstract :
Ferrofluid is usually used as actuation medium in micropump or microvalve where most microchannels were fabricated with PMMA or silicon. The manufacturing is time-consuming and costly. In this paper, we present a novel microchip design based on the magnetic actuation of ferrofluid. The device contains plugs and pistons formed by a ferrofluid which is actuated by an external NdFeB permanent magnet. The ferrofluid used for this application is a colloidal suspension of nanosize Fe3O4 particles in a carrier fluid that is mixed with silicone oil and hexane. The microchannel was fabricated by Poly (dimethylsiloxane) (PDMS) with four reaction zones. The experimental result shows that the ferrofluidic actuation of fluid in the PDMS microchannel was feasible. However, leakage and swelling in the PDMS microchannel might lead to fluid actuation problems. The result also reveals that it has potential application in biochip.
Keywords :
colloids; electromagnetic actuators; iron compounds; magnetic fluids; magnetic particles; microchannel flow; nanoparticles; oils; polymers; silicones; suspensions; PDMS microchannel; biochip; carrier fluid; colloidal suspension; external permanent magnet; ferrofluid actuation; hexane; leakage; magnetic actuation; microchip; nanosize particles; pistons; plugs; poly (dimethylsiloxane); reaction zones; silicone oil; swelling; Iron; Magnetic levitation; Manufacturing; Microchannel; Micropumps; Microvalves; Permanent magnets; Pistons; Plugs; Silicon;
Conference_Titel :
Bioinformatics and Biomedical Engineering (iCBBE), 2010 4th International Conference on
Conference_Location :
Chengdu
Print_ISBN :
978-1-4244-4712-1
Electronic_ISBN :
2151-7614
DOI :
10.1109/ICBBE.2010.5516845