A New Loading Device Driven by Voice Coil Motor

Abstract

The mechanical environment has an important influence on biological behavior of the human musculoskeletal system. Either in vivo or in vitro culture, the growth and development of the musculoskeletal tissue depend on the mechanical environment. Now we propose a new loading device which uses a voice coil motor as driving force to further optimize tissue engineering bioreactor. It can not only provide tissue engineering in vitro culture with different sizes and frequency of loading environments within the physiological range, but also detect the mechanical properties of the culture in building process. This device, which uses the voice coil motor as driving force and closed-loop encoder to control displacement, has the characteristics of low power loss, high acceleration and smooth loading, and can achieve a high-precision loading process with different ranges such as from high-speed to low-speed. The device can facilitate the load research in build process of the engineered musculoskeletal system.