Development of a Latching Valve for Micro-Chem-Lab™

TL;DRAbstract

Abstract An integrated microsystem to detect traces of chemical agents (μChemLab™) is being developed at Sandia for counter-terrorism and nonproliferation applications. This microsystem has two modes of operation: liquid and gas phase detection. For the gas phase detection, we are integrating these critical components: a preconcentrator for sample collection, a gas chromatographic (GC) separator, a chemically selective flexural plate wave (FPW) array mass detector, and a latching valve onto a single chip. By fabricating these components onto a single integrated system (μChemLab™ on a chip), the advantages of reduced dead volume, lower power consumption, and smaller physical size can be realized. In this paper, the development of a latching valve will be presented. The key design parameters for this latching valve are: a volumetric flow rate of 1 mL/min, a maximum hold-off pressure of 40 kPa (6 psi), a relatively low power, and a fast response time. These requirements have led to the de

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