Case Study: Microvisk achieves fast, accurate handheld blood-viscosity measurement with COMSOL Multiphysics

Easy and Accurate Measurement of Blood Viscosity with Breakthrough MEMS-based Device

Microvisk, a North Wales medical‑device company, set out to create a MEMS‑based handheld tester that lets patients monitor blood viscosity/Prothrombin Time at home, but faced a complex multiphysics design challenge: modeling flexible polymer micro‑cantilevers interacting with fluids, thermal and electrostatic effects while working with limited resources. In 2009 Microvisk adopted Comsol Multiphysics from Comsol to support simulation‑led design and verify integration, packaging and signal‑processing before costly prototyping.

Using Comsol Multiphysics (with the MEMS module) Microvisk modeled mechanical, thermal, electrostatic and microfluidic behavior of the chips and capillary feed, which sped iteration, reduced physical prototyping and improved investor reporting. The Comsol‑led approach produced two major design iterations in 15 months, saved an estimated 4–5 months of development time, enabled a design that uses one quarter of the blood volume of existing devices and delivers results in about 30 seconds.

Microvisk

Slava Djakov

Inventor and Sensor Development Director