Mountain, Jeffrey R.2020-09-032020-09-032008-08-03“Design and Fabrication of a Microfluidic Pressure Inverter,” Andrew K. Palican, Silvio A. Chavez, and Jeffrey R. Mountain, Proceedings of IDETC/CIE 2008, ASME 2008 International Design Engineering Technical Conferences & Computers and Information in Engineering Conference, Paper DETC2008-49813, Brooklyn, New York, August 3-6, 2008.https://hdl.handle.net/10657.1/2457Fluidic inverters, or venturi effect vacuum pumps, are commonly used in industrial components that provide a point of use vacuum from an existing compressed air infrastructure. Typical applications include grippers for handling thin sheet, fragile, or polished surface materials. Compressed air usage, representing energy consumption, is significant for these devices. Consequently, a potential customer base has been identified with a need for enhanced energy efficiency. Microfluidic devices represent an approach to address this need. This paper describes the design, fabrication and test process used develop a more energy efficient pressure inverter at the microfluidic scale.en-USDesign, Manufacturing, Microfluidics, Pressure, Compressed air, Energy consumption, Energy efficiency, Grippers, Polishing, Vacuum, Vacuum pumps, Venturi tubesArticle