ABSTRACT
Magnetostrictive materials exhibit a dimensional change under the influence of a magnetic field, As the actuation is achieved in a non-contact manner with this material, it is not necessary to provide physical conncctions to the sample, as required with, say, piezoelectric materials. The potential for wire-frce operation is advantageous in the field of MEMS devices, some of which have been fabricated using thin-film techniques to deposit a range of magnetostrictive materials. An example of such a device is the micropump described by Quandt and Seemann [1].
