Fluidics—A New Technology: An account of the development and the use to which fluid energy can be put

FLUIDICS is a term coined recently defining a rapidly emerging technology which involves the use of gaseous or liquid fluids in motion to perform functions such as amplification, sensing, switching, logic or computation. The accelerating interest in fluidics is no doubt due to the increasing awareness that fluid energy can be manipulated in much the same way as electricity and without moving parts. Also, since fluidic control components are highly reliable under extreme environmental conditions and are impervious to radiation — magnetic or nuclear—they offer many advantages for use in aerospace or nuclear engineering. These particular advantages and others, coupled with the probable low ultimate economic costs of fluidic components, are further stimulating active interest in many commercial and industrial applications.