Scavenged body heat powered infusion pump

An infusion pump powered by body heat is investigated in this paper, with the goal of addressing the needs of dermal wound healing. The infusion pump incorporates a Knudsen gas pump, a type of thermally driven pump, to pneumatic push the pharmaceutical agent from a reservoir. Two designs are considered: an integrated pump and reservoir, and a design with cascaded pump and reservoir. Thermal models are developed for both pumps, and the simulations agree well with the experimental results. The integrated pump and reservoir design uses hydrophobic materials to prevent a flow from occurring unless the infusion pump is placed on a human body. Flow rates in the µL min−1 range for the integrated pump and reservoir, and approximately 70 µL min−1 for the cascaded pump were obtained. The dynamic behavior of the cascaded pump is described based on the thermal models. Multiple copies of the cascaded pump are easily made in series or parallel, to increase either the pressure or the flow rate. The flow rate of multiple pumps in series does not change, and the pressure of multiple pumps in parallel does not change.

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