Peir-Rong Chen a, b, Chia-Fone Lee a, b, c
aDepartment of Otolaryngology, Buddhist Tzu Chi General Hospital, Hualien, Taiwan
bDepartment of Medicine, Tzu Chi University, Hualien, Taiwan
cInstitute of Biomedical Engineering, National Taiwan University, Taipei, Taiwan
Abstract
Objective
An electromagnetic vibration transducer was developed to be used as a hearing aid.
Materials and Methods
This type of electromagnetic transducer should have the following characteristics: small in size, high-energy efficiency and suitable frequency bandwidth. In order to find the output of electromagnetic force and to predict the frequency-amplitude characteristics, a finite element middle ear biomechanical model was used to derive the optimal magnetic force of the actuator in this study. First, the electromagnetic transducer was created using a computer-aided design. The air gap between the magnet and coil, input current and vibration force were calculated using finite element analysis simulation.
Results
Simulated results showed that electromagnetic forces under 1.0 mm air gap was about 5–25 dyne depending on the turns of coils and input current of the actuator.
Conclusion
The designed actuator could be used as transducers for middle ear implants or bone anchors in hearing aids.
Keywords
Actuator; Finite element analysis; Hearing aids
