Electrochemical membrane microactuator with a millisecond response time

•Actuator based on water electrolysis with 1 ms response time is demonstrated.•Fast gas termination is related to the production of nanobubbles by the device.•Well reproducible strokes of a few hundred picoliters have been achieved.•Controlled explosion of gases in the chamber pushes the membrane up to 90 μm.•Circular titanium electrodes survive at least a million cycles. Lack of fast and strong actuators to drive microsystems is well recognized. Electrochemical actuators are considered attractive for many applications but they have long response time (minutes) due to slow gas termination. Here an electrochemical actuator is presented for which the response time can be as short as 1 ms. The alternating polarity water electrolysis is used to drive the device. In this process only nanobubbles are formed. The gas in nanobubbles can be terminated fast due to surface assisted reaction between hydrogen and oxygen that happens at room temperature. The working chamber of the actuator contains concentric titanium electrodes; it has a diameter of 500 μm and a height of 8 μm. The chamber is sealed by a polydimethylsiloxane (PDMS) membrane of 30 μm thick. The device is characterized by an interferometer and a fast camera. Cyclic operation at frequency up to 667 Hz with a stroke of about 30% of the chamber volume is demonstrated. The cycles repeat themselves with high precision providing the volume strokes in picoliter range. Controlled explosions in the chamber can push the membrane up to 90 μm.