High-pressure stainless steel active membrane microvalves

In this work, high-pressure membrane microvalves have been designed, manufactured and evaluated. The valves were able to withstand back-pressures of 200 bar with a response time of less than 0.6 s. These stainless steel valves, manufactured with back-end batch production, utilize the large volume expansion coupled to the solid–liquid phase transition in paraffin wax. When membrane materials were evaluated, parylene coated stainless steel was found to be the best choice as compared to polydimethylsiloxane and polyimide. Also, the influence of the orifice placement and diameter is included in this work. If the orifice is placed too close to the rim of the membrane, the valve can stay sealed even after turning the power off, and the valve will not open until the pressure in the system is released. The developed steel valves, evaluated for both water and air, provide excellent properties in terms of mechanical stability, ease of fabrication, and low cost. Possible applications include sampling at high pressures, chemical microreactors, high performance liquid chromatography, pneumatics, and hydraulics.