Abstract
A piezoelectric actuator was developed for fluid pumps in health monitoring systems. We devised a piezoelectric actuator with some slits, which allows the stretching and contracting deformation in in-plane direction and creates large deflection in out-of-plane direction. The static behaviors under uniform electric field have been analyzed by finite element method. And then, the optimum geometry of slits was searched by response surface methodology for unimorph and bimorph actuators to output the largest deflection under various fixed conditions. The computational results indicated that a bimorph actuator with cross-shaped slit under outside-fixed condition has superior performance for fluid pumps. The proposed slit-inserted actuators have been manufactured as an experiment. As a result, it was verified that the developed actuator can amplify the deflection compared with conventional nonslit actuators.
Highlights
New medical devices, which can extract blood and detect some health indicators such as blood sugar count, are desired for an aging society in Japan
The other approach for improving performance is structural design of piezoelectric actuators
The bimorph actuator reverses the deformation of two piezoelectric plates by opposite electric filed, and it leads to the generation of a large deflection
Summary
New medical devices, which can extract blood and detect some health indicators such as blood sugar count, are desired for an aging society in Japan. Every pump vacuums and discharges the fluids with volumetric change produced by the actuation of the piezoelectric element. Most of lead-free piezoelectric materials are inferior to PZT ceramics. It will require more time to apply novel lead-free piezoelectric materials to fluid pumps. It is difficult to improve the pump performance immediately by employing novel piezoelectric materials. The bimorph actuator reverses the deformation of two piezoelectric plates by opposite electric filed, and it leads to the generation of a large deflection. Unimorph or bimorph piezoelectric actuator is utilized for fluid pumps. Both piezoelectric actuators can generate a large deflection when they are free to deform in the in-plane direction. A prototype of the proposed piezoelectric actuator with slit is manufactured, and the superiority and availability are verified experimentally
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