Design and modeling of a two-magnet actuator for robotic micromanipulation

Abstract

In this paper we optimized the design of a magnetic actuator prototype based on permanent magnets for navigation of magnetic microparticles in cortical microvasculature networks. The proposed design can push-and-pull microparticles in an open-loop strategy in a wide range of several cm with force in the range of few hundred of μN. To do so, a successive quadratic programming (SQP) method is used to solve the optimization problem in terms of stability, displacement and force. To demonstrate the optimized actuator performances, we built a prototype and validated it experimentally. Finally, robotic experiments were conducted in order to investigate the micromanipulation capabilities of the designed actuator in realistic and vascular-shaped microfluidic phantoms mimicking the delivery of drugs to brain tumor sites.