The function of a peristaltic pump is to move fluids through a tube or a flexible hose by using a mechanism called peristalsis. Peristalsis refers to the rhythmic squeezing and relaxing of the pump’s tubing or hose to create a wave-like motion that propels the fluid forward.
Here’s how a peristaltic pump works:
- Tubing or Hose: A peristaltic pump consists of a flexible tubing or hose made of materials such as silicone, rubber, or thermoplastics. The fluid to be pumped is contained within this tubing.
- Rollers or Shoes: The peristaltic pump has rollers or shoes that rotate or oscillate against the tubing/hose. These rollers or shoes squeeze the tubing/hose against a fixed surface, creating a positive displacement action.
- Peristaltic Action: As the rollers or shoes squeeze the tubing/hose, it creates a sealed segment between the squeezed point and the downstream end. The sealed segment moves along the tubing/hose due to the rotation of the rollers or shoes.
- Fluid Propulsion: As the sealed segment moves forward, it pushes the fluid ahead of it. This action propels the fluid through the tubing/hose in a controlled and continuous manner.
The key advantages of peristaltic pumps include:
- Gentle and Non-Contaminating: Since the fluid only comes into contact with the tubing/hose and not the pump itself, peristaltic pumps offer a gentle pumping action that minimizes the risk of contamination or damage to the fluid being pumped.
- Accurate and Repeatable: Peristaltic pumps provide precise control over the flow rate since the flow rate is directly related to the speed of the pump’s rotation. This allows for accurate and repeatable pumping for various applications.
- Versatile and Clean: Peristaltic pumps can handle a wide range of fluids, from corrosive chemicals to viscous substances, without the risk of cross-contamination. They are also easy to clean and sterilize between different fluids.
- Self-Priming: Peristaltic pumps are self-priming, meaning they can start pumping without the need for manual priming or additional equipment.
Given these characteristics, peristaltic pumps are commonly used in various industries and applications, including laboratory research, peristaltic pump function medical and pharmaceutical settings, food and beverage processing, water treatment, and industrial process control.
Here is more information about peristaltic pump:
- Adjustable flow rate: By adjusting the speed of the peristaltic pump, the fluid flow can be accurately adjusted. This adjustability makes peristaltic pumps ideal for applications that require precise flow control, such as laboratory automation, drug delivery, and chemical processing.
- Valveless design: The peristaltic pump is valveless, so it can handle high-viscosity fluids, solid suspensions, and fragile biological samples without worrying about valve clogging or leakage. This makes peristaltic pumps widely used in the fields of life science research, cell culture and biopharmaceutical.
- Countercurrent operation: Due to the working principle of the peristaltic pump, reverse flow can be achieved by changing the steering. This is useful for applications that require reverse flow, mixing, or cleaning.
- High accuracy and repeatability: Peristaltic pumps provide high precision flow control and enable accurate pumping with repeatability. This makes peristaltic pumps useful in applications that require accurate dose delivery, such as medical use, laboratory automation, and chemical processing.
- Low shear pumping: Peristaltic pumps work so that the fluid is subjected to lower shear forces during pumping, which has less impact on sensitive biological samples and cells. This low-shear property makes peristaltic pumps widely used in cell culture, biopharmaceuticals and food processing.
- Optional materials and piping: Peristaltic pump piping materials can be selected according to application requirements to adapt to different fluid characteristics and requirements. Commonly used materials include silicone, rubber, polymers, etc., which can meet the requirements of chemical compatibility, corrosion resistance and wear resistance.
- Programmable control: Some advanced peristaltic pumps have programmable control functions that can be automatically controlled and integrated through external interfaces or control software. This enables the peristaltic pump to be seamlessly integrated with other equipment and systems for complex process control and data logging.
These characteristics of peristaltic pumps make them ideal for many industries and applications. They are widely used in laboratory research, medical industry, biopharmaceutical, food processing, water treatment, chemical industry and environmental monitoring. The reliability, accuracy and adaptability of peristaltic pumps make them an important tool for liquid delivery and fluid control.
