Wirelessly powered microactuators

This paper presents the overall design and implementation of a microactuator which is wirelessly powered and driven by electropermanent magnets. Electropermanent magnet based actuation allows for the actuator to consume power merely during actuation with zero power consumption in between actuations. This has significantly reduced the energy requirement of the actuator, making it easier to be powered wirelessly using inductive power transfer technologies. The wireless power system is designed to host the primary power track on the main control platform with the secondary pickup connected to the microactuator. Power is delivered wirelessly to charge the onboard supercapacitor energy buffer which facilitates the peak power requirement during actuation, which cannot be easily met by a low power wireless power system. Experimental results have shown that the actuator uses 2.5mJ of energy per actuation with the peak power requirement of 40W during the 120μs actuation period, while the wireless power supply is rated up to 1.12W at steady state. The actuator is capable of generating a maximum holding force up to 220mN and deflections up to 2.5mm.