Peristaltic Pump
In 1855, American inventor Rufus Porter and his partner J. D. Bradley patented the first mechanical peristaltic pump to move fluids through flexible tubing without internal valves or impellers.
Porter and Bradley designed their apparatus in Washington, D.C., securing US Patent 12,753 on April 17, 1855. Their mechanism mounted a curved, elastic tube within a rigid circular housing and used revolving rollers on a central wheel to compress the conduit progressively. This rolling occlusion pushed trapped liquid forward while the rebounding tube behind each roller created a vacuum that drew in fresh liquid, mimicking the biological process of peristalsis found in the human digestive system. The inventors proposed the design for diverse tasks, ranging from well pumping to medical stomach evacuation.
The principle gained medical prominence through subsequent inventors who adapted roller mechanisms for biological fluids. In Grand Rapids, Michigan, Eugene E. Allen received US Patent 249,285 in 1881 for an elastic-tube roller pump engineered for blood transfusions. Decades later, in 1932, medical student Michael DeBakey at Tulane University in New Orleans refined the roller pump to provide continuous, low-trauma blood flow, obtaining US Patent 2,018,998 in 1935.
DeBakey’s refined pump became a critical breakthrough in surgery when John Gibbon incorporated it into the first successful heart-lung bypass machine during the 1930s and 1950s. Because the pumped fluid touches only the sterile interior of the tube, modern peristaltic pumps operate across medicine, chemical manufacturing, food processing, and environmental engineering without risking seal degradation or fluid contamination.
By mechanically replicating how intestines propel food, Rufus Porter and J. D. Bradley created a valve-free pump that transformed modern surgery and chemical processing.