MUMBAI, India, May 29 -- Intellectual Property India has published a patent application (202541124300 A) filed by Indian Institute Of Technology, Chennai, Tamil Nadu, on Dec. 9, 2025, for 'a microfluidic propulsion device generating fluid flow under alternating electrical excitation and a method thereof.'
Inventor(s) include Srikanth Vedantam; Shriram Srihari; and Adithya Lakshminarayanan.
The application for the patent was published on May 29, under issue no. 22/2026.
According to the abstract released by the Intellectual Property India: "The present invention discloses a microfluidic propulsion device (100) for generating fluid flow under alternating electrical excitation, and a method (600) thereof. The device (100) comprises a cylindrical outer housing (106) enclosing a centrally aligned microchannel having an inlet region (108), a throat section, and an outlet region (110). A conductive inner wall of the microchannel acts as a primary electrode and forms an electric double layer (EDL) upon interaction with an ionic bio-fluid. At least one asymmetric electrode pair (102, 104) is mounted along the inner wall and is configured to generate a non-uniform tangential electric field. An alternating electrical actuation circuit (112) applies a dual-waveform AC signal across the asymmetric electrode pair (102, 104) to induce electroosmotic slip. The interaction between the electric field and the EDL produces a directional, non-zero time-averaged axial fluid flow accelerated through the microchannel to generate propulsion to enable fuel-free and biocompatible operation."
Disclaimer: Curated by HT Syndication.
