Patterned magnetic traps for magnetophoretic assembly and actuation of microrotor pumps

We demonstrate a microscopic magnetic rotor pump for fluidic channels whose components are assembled in situ and powered by weak external magnetic fields (<150 Oe). A platform of patterned Permalloy microdisks and microcavities provided for the transport, trapping, and rotation of the superparamagnetic spherical microrotors. Parallel actuation of several rotors without direct physical link to external energy sources, tunable rotation speeds, and reversible drive torques offers significant advantages over macroscopic techniques to control flow within microfluidic devices. The effectiveness of trapping and transporting magnetic nanoparticles by the disks illustrate scalability to smaller, submicrometer sized devices. (C) 2011 American Institute of Physics. [doi:10.1063/1.3562037]