Vibrating Mesh Nebulizer using PIC MCU
A nebulizer is a medical device that is used to transform a liquid medicine into aerosol droplets so that patients with pulmonary diseases can easily inhale the medication into lungs. Medical nebulizers are commonly used for the treatment of COPD, asthma, cystic fibrosis and other respiratory diseases. This application note from Microchip demonstrates an implementation of driving a piezo mesh disk in a vibrating mesh nebulizer demo. The demo system features a Microchip 8-bitPIC16F1713 microcontroller-based piezo mesh disk driver board and a nebulizer plastic housing.
Block diagram of the nebulizer reference design
Vibrating mesh nebulizer using PIC mcu
A significant innovation made in the nebulizer market is vibrating mesh technology. Basically, a vibrating mesh nebulizer is composed of a liquid reservoir with a piezo mesh disk mounted on one side of it, and a piezo mesh driver circuit board with batteries. The piezo mesh disk consists of a stainless steel plate that has been perforated with thousands of precision-formed, laser-drilled holes, and surrounded by a piezoelectric material.
The piezoelectric material will vibrate at a very high rate of speed when it is driven by an analog signal of specific voltage, frequency, and waveform that is generated by the driver board. As a result of rapid vibration, solution is drawn through the holes to form droplets of consistent size that are delivered at a low velocity to be be inhaled directly into the lungs.