Abstract

Elasto-Magnetic Pumps for Point-of-Care Diagnostics

Jacob Binsley, Student, University of Exeter

We have developed a possible novel pumping solution and have fabricated and tested an experimental, elasto-magnetic micropump inspired by Purcell’s 3-link swimmer. This design, consisting of 3 elasticated links made from PDMS, is coupled to an external magnetic driving field via the inclusion of a small Neodymium Iron Boron magnet. When provided with a weak, uniaxial oscillating driving field with flux density of 10s of gauss and frequency in the range of 10s of Hz, the device produces tuneable and reversible fluid flow. During our most recent investigations, we modelled this system numerically using COMSOL Multiphysics to not only verify our experiments, but to explore the device more deeply and gain an understanding of how this system may be optimised. These new numerical results will be the main subject of this talk, and offer valuable and very visual insight into bio-inspired pumping mechanisms for lab-on-a-chip POC devices.