Shaftless Disk - type Self-bearing Motor for Artificial Heart

인공심장용 무축(無軸) 원판형 자기 부상 모터

In order to apply into a compact and reliable centrifugal blood pump, this paper introduces a self-bearing motor in which a rotor is rotated without contact. The rotor is actively controlled in only radial directions, while the axial and tilting motions are passively stable owing to the disk-shape structure of the rotor. A prototype was made in outer-rotor type that is far better in the compactness than inner-rotor type. The prototype could be driven up to 8000 rpm with the rotor vibration under 0.12mm. The maximum cardiac output and pressure head were 9 L/min and over 200 mmHg, respectively. These experimental results show that the proposed self-bearing motor has sufficient performance for application to a real blood pump.