Design and Validation of an Accessible and 3D-Printable 24-Channel Peristaltic Pump for Cell Culture Research

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URL: https://hdl.handle.net/1974/33343

Abstract

Peristaltic pumps are an essential part of biomedical research worldwide. The peristaltic pumps used for cell culture are precise and accurate machines which cycle media to and from cells during experiments. Commercial peristaltic pumps pose barriers for all labs due to expensive purchase and repair costs, however they are especially inaccessible for labs with limited research funding and excessive importation time. 3D printing has been shown to be an accessible method of fabrication worldwide [1]. In 2020, a 3D-printable peristaltic pump was developed to address these concerns, called the FAST-pump [2]. This pump design has 8 channels, allowing for labs to fabricate their own pumps and conduct research with sample sizes of 8 or less. However, large experimental sample sizes are advantageous by increasing the statistical power and the number of independent variables per experiment and are often utilized in cell culture research applications [3], [4], [5]. This thesis aimed to create and validate an accessible 24-channel peristaltic pump design for research labs that is low-cost, locally resourced, user-friendly, reliable, and allows for triple the experimental number of samples than existing 3D-printable peristaltic pumps. The product was designed according to the needs of stakeholders: researchers at the Center for Health Innovation (CHI) at Queen’s University and the B3MAT research group at Universidad Adolfo Ibanez in Viña del Mar, Chile. A House of Quality (HoQ) was constructed to determine customer requirements and the associated functional requirements of the design. A 3D-printable, 24-channel peristaltic pump was designed, fabricated with ABS-M30 material, and assembled with off-the-shelf components. The assembled pump was iterated and validated to compare its performance to a commercial 24-channel peristaltic pump. This thesis demonstrated the reduced cost (6.1%) of a 24-channel 3D-printed peristaltic pump and compared its performance to the commercial alternative. This thesis also provided insights and recommendations for next steps of the pump design and validation, and provided open-source resources available in English: STL and CAD files, an Arduino IDE script, and comprehensive user guide manual for the assembly, operation, and calibration of the 3D-printable 24-channel peristaltic pump.

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