A Silicon Pneumatic Microvalve with Full In-Channel Structure and the Formation Technology of Functional Fluidic Integrated Circuits

摘要

In this paper, a pneumatic silicon microvalve with full in-channel structure applicable to micro fluidic systems, and its novel application to functional fluidic integrated circuits are presented. This microvalve works as transistor like device in fluidic integrated circuits by means of its pneumatic inlet port connected to a front-side fluid channel. Fabricated microvalves showed good performance for fluid flow control. The "pressure inverting amplifier" was also fabricated as an example of fluidic integrated circuit using this microvalve. The measured pressure gain of the amplifier reached about 32.0 dB. Many kinds of functional fluidic circuits can be realized with the new concept presented in this article. For example, signal-processing circuits formed by the fluidic circuit technology can operate at very severe environments at which any electron devices cannot operate. This technology will be a novel IC technology to realize novel functions by fluidic microchip devices.