A Study of Electromagnetic Actuator for Electro-pneumatic Driven Ventricular Assist Device

An electromechanical type is the most useful mechanism in the various pumping mechanisms. It, however, requires a movement converting system including a ball screw, a helical cam, or a solenoid-beam spring, which makes the device complex and may lessen reliability. Thus, the authors have hypothesized that an electromagnetic actuator mechanism can eliminate the movement converting system and that thereby enhance the mechanical reliability and operative simplicity of an electro­pneumatic pump. The purpose of this study was to show a novel application of electromagnetic actuator mechanism in pulsatile pump and to provide preliminary data for further evaluations. The electromagnetic actuator consists of stators with a single winding excitation coil and movers with a high energy density neodymium-iron-boron permanent magnet. A 0.5mm diameter wire was used for the excitation coil, and 1000 turns were wound onto the stators core with parallel. A prototype of extracorporeal electro-pneumatic pump was constructed, and the pump performance tests were performed using a mock system to evaluate the efficiency of the electromagnetic actuator mechanism. When forward and backward electric currents were supplied to the excitation coil, the mover effectively moved back and forth. The nominal stroke length of the actuator was 10mm. The actuator dimension was 120mm in diameter and 65mm in height with a mass of 1.4kg. The prototype pump unit was 150mm in diameter, 150mm in thickness and 4.5kg in weight. The maximum force output was 70N at input current of 4.5A and the maximum pump rate was 150 beats per minute. The maximum output was 2.0 L/minute at a rate of 80bpm when the afterload was 100mmHg. The electromagnetic actuator mechanism was successfully applied to construct the prototype of extracorporeal electro­pneumatic pump. The authors provide the above results as a preliminary data for further studies.