A wearable, nozzle-diffuser microfluidic pump based on high-performance ferroelectric nanocomposites

New target applications for microfluidic devices have been focused on home usability, wearability and cost-effectiveness. Towards these goals, in this work, a controllable, bendable, and all-organic, nozzle-diffuser microfluidic pump was designed, fabricated and tested. First, to resolve the crucial issue of high driving voltage, the ferroelectric polymer poly(vinylidene fluoride-trifluoroethylene) (P(VDF-TrFE)) was optimized by adding core-shell structured Al2O3@CNT nanofillers. The membrane so developed with 1.1 wt% Al2O3@CNT showed an increase by nearly 7 times in the induced strain in comparison to the neat P(VDF-TrFE) at low electric fields, because the modified membrane simultaneously achieved a lower coercive electric field and a higher polarization. Accordingly, the required operating voltage of the microfluidic pump integrated with optimized membrane significantly decreased from 1000 V to 160 V. Meanwhile, this pump exhibited a wider range of flow rates (13-135 mu L/min) than the reported results, associated with the higher output pressure in our membranes. Importantly, the designed pump still possessed an excellent controllability of the fluidic processes, though it underwent a large bending up to 74 degrees. Consequently, the extremely promising application of the as-prepared microfluidic pump in wearable, biomedical devices was demonstrated.

Automated summary

New microfluidic pump designed in this work achieved significant reduction in operating voltage, wider range of flow rates, and excellent controllability of fluidic processes through the optimization of ferroelectric polymer with nanofillers. This pump shows promising applications in wearable, biomedical devices.