Review of Thermal Bubble Micro-actuators for Micro-fluidics

Thermal bubble micro-actuator is one branch of MEMS actuators and is also an important driving method for micro-fluidics. There are no moveable mechanical parts and any mechanical deformation in the thermal bubble micro-actuator for micro-fluidics. Additionally, the structure of the thermal bubble micro-actuator is simple, and it is easily fabricated and has better reliability. Therefore, the thermal bubble micro-actuator has a broad prospect application in aerospace, biomedical, and chemical. Four heating methods are currently adopted by the thermal bubble micro-actuator for micro-fluidics. They are micro resistor heater, micro induction heater, laser heater, and spark heater. This paper summarizes the new researches of the micro-actuators for micro-fluidics with different heating methods. The principles, structures, micro fabrications, experimental results and characteristics of different micro-actuators studied recently are introduced. Then, the trend of development and research method of micro-actuators for micro-fluidics are also analyzed.