Fluid-Structure Interaction Analysis on Membrane Behavior of a Microfluidic Passive Valve

Abstract

In this paper, the effect of membrane features on flow characteristics in the microfluidic passive valve (MPV) and the membrane behavior against fluid flow are studied using the fluid-structure interaction (FSI) analysis. Firstly, the microvalve model with different numbers of microholes and pitches of microholes are designed to investigate the flow rate of the MPV. The result shows that the number of microholes on the membrane has a significant impact on the flow rate of the MPV, while the pitch of microholes has little effect on it. The constant flow rate maintained by the microvalve (the number of microholes n = 4) is 5.75 mL/min, and the threshold pressure to achieve the flow rate is 4 kPa. Secondly, the behavior of the membrane against the fluid flow is analyzed. The result shows that as the inlet pressure increases, the flow resistance of the MPV increases rapidly, and the deformation of the membrane gradually becomes stable. Finally, the effect of the membrane material on the flow rate and the deformation of the membrane are studied. The result shows that changes in the material properties of the membrane cause a decrease in the amount of deformation in all stages the all positions of the membrane. This work may provide valuable guidance for the optimization of microfluidic passive valve in microfluidic system.

A Semi-Linear Elliptic Model for a Circular Membrane MEMS Device Considering the Effect of the Fringing Field

“…Moreover, many researchers are actively engaged in the development of important experimental research works for the development and prototyping of special MEMS such as, for example, circular graphene membrane MEMS devices [ 43 , 44 ], SiN circular membrane MEMS devices [ 45 , 46 ], and CMOS MEMS-based membrane-bridge devices [ 47 ] particularly useful for industrial applications. Moreover, the scientific community is intensively working on the analysis/synthesis of multi-physical models characterized by a high degree of symmetry, because these are more easily achievable from a technological point of view [ 24 , 30 , 48 , 49 , 50 , 51 ]. Accordingly, we have focused our attention on a 2 D circular membrane MEMS device, a kind of geometry widely used in many industrial applications [ 24 , 25 , 48 , 52 ].…”

A Review of Passive Constant Flow Regulators for Microfluidic Applications

“…The design of the passive microfluidic devices described in the previous sections required two-dimensional (2D) or 3D FEM simulations of fluid flows fully coupled with structures undergoing large deformation, nonlinear material response, and contact conditions [58][59][60][61][62][63]. The non-well-defined Young's Modulus of some elastomeric materials (e.g., PDMS), coupled with the difficult adaptative meshing of high aspect ratio structures, are a challenge in computational engineering.…”

Flow Regulation Performance Analysis of Microfluidic Passive Valve for High Throughput Liquid Delivery

“…The elastic membrane has two orifices. Later, Lin et al [ 43 ] optimized the structure of this valve, and studied the effect of different numbers of holes on constant flow. The purpose of the above research is to realize that the outlet flow rate remains constant when the inlet pressure reaches a certain threshold.…”