A magnetically driven PDMS micropump with microball valves

We present a novel robust PDMS membrane micropump with two one-way microball valves for biomedical applications. The actuating membrane is driven by magnetic force of two miniature permanent magnets. The micropump consists of two PDMS layers, one holding the microball valves and actuating chamber and the second holding the top magnet and covering the chamber and microvalves. A simple approach is used to fabricate a high performance microball valve using an embedded Teflon/sup /spl trade// microtube. A small DC motor (6mm in diameter and 15mm in length) with two permanent magnetic discs (NdFeB) mounted on its shaft is used to actuate the membrane-mounted magnet. This configuration yields a large pumping rate with very low power consumption. Maximum pumping rate of 260/spl mu/L/min was achieved at the input power of 21mW, the highest pumping rate reported in the literature for micropumps at such power consumption.