Journal of Magnetism and Magnetic Materials 241 (2002) 292–302

Force and torque characteristics for magnetically driven

blood pump
Pan Zheng, Yousef Haik*, Mohammad Kilani, Ching-Jen Chen
Department of Mechanical Engineering, Biomagnetic Engineering Laboratory, FAMU-FSU College of Engineering,
2525 Pottsdamer Street, Tallahassee, FL 32310, USA

Received 10 August 2001; received in revised form 19 November 2001

Abstract

Magnetically driven screw pumps were designed and fabricated for pumping biological fluids. The magnetic field
simulations for three different magnetic coupling arrangements were obtained numerically. The force and torque for the
three arrangements were computed. The effect of the separation gap between poles and the rotational angle on the force
and torque is also presented. The pump characteristics were obtained experimentally. r 2002 Elsevier Science B.V. All
rights reserved.

Keywords: Magnetically driven pump; Screw pump; Magnetic force; Magnetic torque; Magnetic coupling

1. Introduction transmitted to the pump from an outside motor

Blood pumps are important components of
several clinical devices in use today [1]. Typical
examples such as open heart surgery, life-sustain-
ing devices relying on blood pumps include heart–
lung machines, left ventricular assist devices and
total artificial hearts [2–4].
From an engineering point of view, a pump is a
device in which energy is transferred into the fluid
in order to increase its pressure or kinetic energy.
For the pump to operate, it must have (a) a power
mechanism by which power is transmitted to the
pump from an outside source and (b) a fluid
dynamics mechanism capable of conveying the
power to the fluid. In this study, the power is
*Corresponding author. Tel.: +1-850-410-6431; fax: +1-
850-410-6484.
E-mail address: haik@eng.fsu.edu (Y. Haik).
through magnetic coupling without physical con-
nection. Two different configurations that are
designed to pump blood are shown in Fig. 1(a)
and (b). Fig. 1(c) shows the schematic of pump
components. The pump consists of a single screw
that rotates inside a close-fitting barrell. The screw
is rotated by the effect of magnetic coupling
between permanent magnets attached to the screw
and magnets attached to an outside motor. The
inside magnets follow and synchronize with the
outside magnets. The rotation of the screw moves
the fluid forward in the channel between the screw
core and the barrel and increases its hydrostatic
pressure. The fluid enters at the feed port and exits
at the discharge port due to the continuous
rotation of the screw. Because of the self-contained
seal, the interaction between the pump and the
outside environment is minimized. The mechanical
friction is also minimized. The conduction of heat

0304-8853/02/$ - see front matter r 2002 Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserved.
PII: S 0 3 0 4 - 8 8 5 3 ( 0 1 ) 0 1 3 7 2 - 5
 P. Zheng et al. / Journal of Magnetism and Magnetic Materials 241 (2002) 292–302
Fig. 1. (a) Lateral flow configuration; (b) combined lateral–axial flow configuration; (c) schematic diagram of a magnetically driven
screw pump.
from the driving motor to the inside fluid is
eliminated. Another advantage of this design is
that it allows the pump to be disposable and
eliminates the possibility of bio-contamination.
Araki et al. [5] investigated the relationship
between hemolysis and heat generation in six types
of centrifugal blood pumps. They found a strong
correlation between hemolysis and heat genera-
tion. They also concluded that the heat is
conducted from the driving motor to the blood.
In addition, the friction between the shaft and seal
generates heat locally which also causes hemolysis.
In this study, screw-type pumps were found to
offer certain advantages in terms of (a) design
simplicity, (b) suitability for magnetic coupling
and (c) possibility of low hemolysis of blood cells.
The application of screw pump mechanisms for
blood transport has been successfully demon-
strated by several investigators [6–9]. Owing to
293
their compactness and simplicity, screw pumps
have received serious consideration in blood
transport applications and several new designs
are being explored [10].
The term magnetic pumps has existed for several
years. Some of these pumps utilize magnetic force
to create a seal mechanism that is able to provide
lubrication to the driving shaft and a seal [11].
Other magnetic pumps use the magnetic clutch
mechanism to provide a coupling between the
driving motor and the driven pumping mechanism.
In this study, the pumping mechanism is a screw-
shaped shaft that is remotely driven by magnets
[12,13]. Magnetically driven screw pump provides
a sealed mechanism to pump blood and other
biohazard fluids in a disposable, safe and low-cost
device.
In this study, the performance of the two pumps
was tested experimentally. The magnetic coupling
294 P. Zheng et al. / Journal of Magnetism and Magnetic Materials 241 (2002) 292–302
between the driving and driven sets is investigated
numerically. The magnetic field distribution be-
tween the coupling magnets, the magnetic force
and magnetic torques are computed. The effect of
the separation distance between the driving and
driven magnets is also investigated.
2. Magnetically driven screw pumps design and
performance
The fluid in the screw pump is contained in the
channel between the screw and inside surface of
the barrel. The channel is bounded by the screw
flights on its sides and the screw core on the
bottom. The top of the channel is the inner surface
of the barrel. Because of the rotation of the screw,
the fluid is contained within a system that has both
Fig. 2. (a) Pump characteristic, Model 1; (b) pump characteristics, Model 2.
a moving boundary (surfaces of the screw) and a
stationary boundary (barrel surface). With the
necessary condition that the fluid has a certain
viscosity, a drag flow is established in the fluid. It is
only because of the existence of this drag flow that
a screw pump is able to operate.
Two model prototypes as shown in the sche-
matics, Fig. 1(a) and (b), were prepared to measure
the flow rate–pressure head characteristics of
screw pumps. The difference between two models
is that the exit of the first model is normal to the
axis of screw core, the exit of second model is
parallel to the axis of the screw core. Both models
have a screw length of 10 cm and a diameter of
1.9 cm. The first prototype, M1, (schematic
Fig. 1(a)) has a pitch of 0.64 cm (4 threads/in)
while the second model, M2, (schematic Fig. 1(b))
has a pitch of 1.3 cm (2 threads/in). The flow
 P. Zheng et al. / Journal of Magnetism and Magnetic Materials 241 (2002) 292–302
rate–pressure head characteristics for model M1
and M2 are shown in Fig. 2(a) and (b), respectively.
The fluid used in the experiment is water with a
viscosity of 1
106 m2/s. Experiments were con-
ducted with a steady liquid at the inlet. The
rotation of screw was generated by magnetic
coupling as described. The rotation speeds were
set from 0 to 3300 rpm.
It can be seen from Fig. 2(a) and (b) that in
order to achieve the same flow rate and a pressure
head, model M2 need to rotate at a higher speed
than M1. For example, when the head pressure is
maintained to 18 mmHg for both models, the
rotating rate of M2 need to be 3200 rpm while that
of M1 just needs 2300 rpm to keep a same flow rate
of 3 ml/s. This is mainly due to the difference in the
helix angle (j) between the two models (refer to
Fig. 1(c)). Model with small helix angle j will
produce large viscous drag effect to act in the
direction of the screw axis. High helix angle j may
cause the screw to produce large viscous drag
effect on the direction normal to the screw axis and
produces significant secondary flow. Since the flow
rate of the screw pump is determined by the axial
velocity along the screw channel, decreasing the
screw helix angle will result in a higher flow rate
for the same speed and head pressure.
In separate experiments with human blood, the
level of hemolysis during the pumping was
measured by the amount of free hemoglobin in
plasma of the pumped blood. The blood sample
from model M2 was found to have much less of
free hemoglobin than that of model M1. This
suggests that changes in exit port location can
have a profound effect on the hemolytic level of
the screw pump.
3. Mathematical modeling of magnetic coupling
The magnetic force and torque for the magnetic
driving mechanism are important to the design of
magnetically driven screw pump. The force and
torque depend on several factors such as the
number of interacting poles, the separation dis-
tance, the strength of the magnet and the lag angle.
Fig. 3 shows a schematic for one configuration
that put two magnets made of Neodymium Iron
295
Fig. 3. 2-pole magnetic coupling.
Boron (NdFeB) on an iron plate with a thickness
of 2 mm. This set is for the driving mechanism.
Another set of two magnets is placed on the plastic
plate facing the driving set, this is the driven set.
The magnets are arranged in such a way that the
north poles of the driving set are facing the south
poles of the driven set and are placed in alternating
poles on each plate. A gap is maintained between
the two sets. The magnetic field distribution, the
magnetic force and the torque are numerically
computed by using a boundary element based
solver.
According to Gauss’s law for magnetism r 
! ,
B ¼ 0; B is the magnetic induction or flux density.
It is convenient to introduce the potential value
due to a given current distribution. A vector
,
magnetic potential A is defined as
~
~¼r
A
B ð1Þ
~ ¼ m0 H
with B ~ in free space, where H ~ is the
magnetic field strength, the differential form of
Ampere’s law can be written as
~ ¼ m0 J~
r
B ð2Þ
where J~ is the electric current density.
Specifying r  A~ ¼ 0; and substituting Eq. (2)
into Eq. (1), leads to the vector Poisson equation
given by
~ ¼ m0 J~:
r2 A ð3Þ
296 P. Zheng et al. / Journal of Magnetism and Magnetic Materials 241 (2002) 292–302
The analytical solution form is
Z ~
J ,
~ ¼ m0
A dV ðWb=mÞ:
4p V R
Vector R is the distance from the field sustain
source to the observation point. V is the current
source volume. For the permanent magnet,
magnetization can be expressed with an equiva-
lence as volume current and surface current,
respectively, by
J~M ¼ r
M
~ ð5Þ
and
~ ~
~
jM ¼ M n:
Here ~
n is the outward unit normal to the surface S:
Practically, the effect of volume magnetization is
only noticeable in volumes where the field is
rapidly changing from a saturated state to
unsaturated state. For many problems the effect
of the volume magnetization is small and can be
neglected.
Then Eq. (4) can be rewritten as
Z ~
jM
~ ¼ m0
A dS: ð7Þ
4p S R
Eqs. (1) and (7) should satisfy two boundary
conditions
, ,
ms H sn ¼ m0 H n ;
, , ,
H st  H t ¼ J s :
The subscript s denotes source magnet, n
,
denotes normal, and t is the tangential. J s is the
,
surface current, namely, j M : Multiple ways such as
finite difference (FDM), finite element method
(FEM) and boundary element method (BEM) can
be applied to solve the field equations. With
boundary integral equation formulation, the po-
,
tential A of Eq. (7) is not solved directly, but an
equivalent source, which would sustain the field, is
found by forcing it to satisfy prescribed boundary
and interface conditions under a function which
relates the location and effect of the source to any
point on the boundary. The main advantages of
this method over direct approach (FDM, FEM) is
that it effectively eliminates the need for a finite-
element mesh or a finite-difference grid [14–19].
ð4Þ Once the magnetic potential A is obtained, the
,
force F between two magnets can be computed
using basic relation for the force on a distribution
of current in the external field:
Z
F~ ¼ J~
B
~ext dV : ð10Þ
V
,
Torque T can be calculated by
Z
~
T ¼ ~
ðJ~
B
R ~ext Þ dV : ð11Þ
V
We can use the same way as in Eqs. (5) and (6) to
ð6Þ compute the equivalent current J~ of the target
magnet.
4. Setup for numerical simulation
The numerical code Amperes1 verified using
experimental procedure utilizing the interaction
between forces caused by a similar pole opposing
magnets. The computed force was within the 10%
experimental error of the experimental results.
Additionally, the computed results were in good
agreement with the analytical results obtained by
Furlani [20] when the magnetization is assumed
constant.
When the experimental setup shown in Fig. 1(a)
ð8Þ
and (b) runs to find the pump characteristics it was
observed that when the driving motor speed was
ð9Þ increased rapidly a slip in the magnetic couple
would occur and cause a back flow in the pump.
Thus, it becomes important to optimize the magnetic
coupling between the driving and driven magnets
with numerical simulation. Different setups for the
magnetic coupling mechanism were computed:
(a) Sets of 2-pole magnets opposing each other
with opposing poles (i.e. north facing south),
shown in Fig. 3.
(b) Sets of 4-pole magnets opposing each other
with opposing poles, shown in Fig. 4.
(c) Sets of 6-pole magnets opposing each other
with opposing fields, shown in Fig. 5.
1
Integrated Engineering Software Inc., Amperes 3D Mag-
netic Field Solver V4.0.
 P. Zheng et al. / Journal of Magnetism and Magnetic Materials 241 (2002) 292–302
Fig. 4. 4-pole magnetic coupling.
Fig. 5. 6-pole magnetic coupling.
Further, computations were conducted to
(i) Compare the magnetic force and torque for
all three setups at different separation gaps, L:
(ii) Compare the magnetic force and torque at
different rotation angles, y:
(iii) Effect of the magnetic property of the plates
on the coupling force.
Figs. 3–5 show schematics for the 2-, 4-, and 6-
pole magnets sets, respectively. The magnets are
NdFeB with the residual induction Br =1.085 T,
coercive force Hc =767,922 A/m, intrinsic coercive
force Hci =1,074,295 A/m. The magnets dimen-
sions are: diameter d ¼ 13 mm, height h ¼ 6 mm,
shown in Fig. 3. The plates are either made out of
steel or plastic, the steel relative permeability mr ¼
2000: The diameter of the plate is 40 mm and the
thickness is 2 mm. L is the separation gap between
two opposite magnets nearest surface. Using
Integrated Engineering Software’s 3D magnetic
field solver, which is based on BEM, the force and
torque were calculated with the source magnets
297
rotating and the load magnets fixed through a
series of angular displacement values y from 01 to
901.
5. Discussion
5.1. Number of magnetic poles
Fig. 6(a) shows the magnetic field distribution
on the plane between the two sets that is 0.5 mm
above the load magnets for 2-pole magnetic
coupling setup. The separation distance between
the two sets is L ¼ 4 mm. The poles where aligned
such that the two opposing poles on the two sets
are facing each other. The angle of rotation in this
case is set to zero. As shown in Fig. 6, the magnetic
field is strongest in the area where the two poles
are coupling with each other. Some cross coupling
between magnets on the same set is also shown.
Fig. 6(b) shows the field profile distribution drawn
in 3 dimensions for the same plane as in Fig. 6(a).
Figs. 7(a), (b), 8(a) and (b) show the magnetic
field distribution for the 4- and 6-pole magnets
sets, respectively. As shown in the figures the
closer the distance between the magnets on the
plate the more cross connect occurs on the same
plate. The nearer the neighboring magnet the
denser are the magnetic loops produced between
the two magnets.
The field magnitude across a diagonal line
0.5 mm above the poles (6.5 mm above the plate)
for the 2-, 4-, and 6-pole arrangements is shown in
Fig. 9 when the separation distance between the
two opposing set is 30 mm. As shown in Fig. 9, the
magnetic field strength varies slightly on the
surface of the magnets, however, it maintains at
around the maximum value. The magnets on the
same plate are separated apart by a distance of
14 mm (measuring from the axis of the magnets).
The magnetic field reaches a minimum at middle
point between the magnets. The 4- and 6-pole
magnetic coupling sets show the lower minimum
than the 2-pole magnetic coupling set because of
the cross connection on the same plate between the
poles.
Fig. 10 shows the field strength distribution on a
diagonal line in a plane at a distance 6.5 mm above
298 P. Zheng et al. / Journal of Magnetism and Magnetic Materials 241 (2002) 292–302

Fig. 6. Magnetic flux density distributions on the plane that is 0.5 mm above the load magnets with separation of 4 mm of 2-pole set:
(a) solid-contour; (b) 3D profile.

the plate for the 2-, 4- and 6-magnet sets when the
two opposing sets are 4 mm apart. As shown from
the figure the maximum field magnitude of the 4-
pole setting is larger than that of the 6-pole setting,
and the maximum field magnitude of the 2-pole
setting is smallest. This shows that increasing
the pole number cannot assure the increasing of
the magnetic field instensity at certain point. As
the number of poles that are placed in alternating
mode increases, the distance between similar poles
decreases, thus the magnetic field of that is induced
by the same magnetization poles will counteract by
the field that is induced by different magnetization
poles. As the separtion distance between the two sets
becomes closer, a higher concentration of the field
is obtained, thus causes a higher attraction force.
 P. Zheng et al. / Journal of Magnetism and Magnetic Materials 241 (2002) 292–302 299

Fig. 7. The magnetic flux density distribution on the plane that is 0.5 mm above the load magnets with a separation of 4 mm of 4-pole
set: (a) solid-contour; (b) 3D profile.

5.2. Effect of the separation gap
The effect of the gap between the two sets of
magnets is investigated. Fig. 11 shows the force as
a function of the separation distance between the
two opposing sets. As shown in the figure, the 2-
pole curves cross over the 6-pole curve at a
separation distance of 24 mm. The 2-pole magnetic
coupling set has shown the smallest attraction
force for gaps o24 mm. The 4-pole magnetic
coupling set has shown a higher magnetic force
than the 6-pole and the 2-pole magnetic coupling
sets in the investigated separation range of the
4–30 mm. The smaller the gap between the poles
the higher the coupling force.
5.3. Effect of plate material
The effect of the plate material type where the
magnets are attached on the driving and driven
300 P. Zheng et al. / Journal of Magnetism and Magnetic Materials 241 (2002) 292–302

Fig. 8. The magnetic flux density distribution on the plane that is 0.5 mm above the load magnets with a separation of 4 mm of 6-pole
set: (a) solid-contour; (b) 3D profile.

plates is also investigated. Fig. 12 shows two

Fig. 9. B-field of 2-, 4-, and 6-pole magnetic coupling with a
separation of 30 mm.
curves for the force as a function of the separation
distance for the 2-pole magnetic coupling set. The
computations which made two different cases were
(a) both plates are made of steel with mr ¼ 2; 000
and (b) one plate (driving) is made of steel and the
other plate (driven) is made of plastic. The second
scenario is more practical for the magnetically
driven pump that is used to pump blood. As
shown when the two plates are made out of steel, a
higher coupling force is produced. However, the
 P. Zheng et al. / Journal of Magnetism and Magnetic Materials 241 (2002) 292–302
Fig. 10. B-field of 2-, 4-, and 6-pole magnetic coupling with a
separation of 4 mm.
Fig. 11. Magnetic force of different poles.
difference is o15% between these two different
plate settings.
5.4. Driving angle
The driven (load) magnets will be lagging the
driving (source) magnets that will maintain a
torque to overcome the friction and flow pressure
in the screw pump. The lag angle Dy should be no
more than the angle yp at which the torque reaches
its peak. The torques are a function of the
separation distance, the rotation angle and the
number of magnets. Fig. 13 shows the torque as a
function of the rotation angle with different
separation distance for the 2-pole magnetic cou-
pling set. The angle yp decreases when the
separation decreases. For example, for a separa-
tion of 4 mm, the maximum torque is obtained at
angle yp ¼ 27:51; while the maximum torque is
obtained at yp ¼ 351 when the separation distance
is 12 mm.
301
Fig. 12. Magnetic force versus separation
Fig. 13. Magnetic torque versus separation.
Fig. 14 shows the magnetic torque distribution
as a function of the rotation angle for the 2-, 4-
and 6-pole magnetic coupling sets with a separa-
tion distance of 4 mm. The computation is made
for the range 0oyo901: The torque is smallest for
the 2-pole magnetic coupling set, as the angle is
over 901, the repulsive force is increasing, as the
two magnets with same magnetization direction
will be closer and this force can still produce a
driving torque for the rotation of screw pump. It
will be an impeding torque after the lag angle is
over 1801. For the 4-pole magnetic coupling setup,
the two same magnetization direction magnets will
face each other at an angle of 901. For the 6-pole
set the similar magnets will face each other at an
angle of 601. When the lag angle is over those
degrees for different poles setting, respectively, the
torque will retard the screw pump’s rotation. The
torque is a cross product of the force and the arm.
302 P. Zheng et al. / Journal of Magnetism and Magnetic Materials 241 (2002) 292–302
Fig. 14. Torque of 2-, 4-, and 6-pole magnetic coupling with
separation of 4 mm at different rotation angles.
When the force and arm are parallel to each other
as in y ¼ 0 although the force is maximum but the
arm is parallel to the force, thus the torque in this
situation is equal to zero.
When Dy is larger than yp ; the torque decreases
and slippage may occur in the operation of the
magnetic pump. The torque varies periodically. To
keep the screw rotating stably with the same rate
as motor, it is important to improve the coupling
torque and assure that the necessary torque to
drive the pump is no more than the torque the
magnetic coupling can provide.
6. Conclusion
This study presents the characteristics of two
models of a magnetically driven screw pumps that
were developed to pump blood. It was found that
when the exit port is placed along the axis of
rotation, the hemolysis was lower compared to an
exit port perpendicular to the axis of rotation. The
magnetic characteristics for the coupling force and
torque were investigated using a 3D solver that is
base on boundary element method. Three different
magnetic configurations were studied. Based on
the practical separation distance and the needed
torque to drive the pump and considering the force
and dimension of the setting, it was concluded that
a 4-pole configuration might be the optimal
configuration compared with 2- and 6-pole con-
figuration. The closer the opposing poles to each
other the better coupling could be achieved; for a
practical setting up to 4 mm separation gap for a
4-pole setting will be accepted.
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