High performance room temperature gas sensor based on novel morphology of zinc oxide nanostructures

Zinc oxide uniform nanostructures with novel morphologies were synthesized through simple and fast ammonia based controlled precipitation method in aqueous media and in the absence of any additive. Selected batches of the synthesized solids were characterized by SEM, XRD, FTIR and TG/DTA. FTIR analysis revealed that the morphology of nanostructures had little effect on their IR spectral profile of the synthesized material. The as-prepared, calcined and commercial ZnO nanostructures (ZnO-AP, ZnO-Cal and ZnO-Com) were then employed as gas sensors for the detection of ammonia, acetone and ethanol. ZnO-AP and ZnO-Cal based sensors showed superior and reproducible performance towards 1×10−6 ammonia with gas response of 63.79% and 66.87% and response/recovery time of 13 and 3 s, respectively, at room temperature (29 °C). This was attributed to the unique morphology and remarkable uniformity in shape and size of the synthesized nanostructures. In contrast, the ZnO-Com based sensor did not respond to ammonia concentration less than 200×10−6. In addition, ZnO-Cal showed high selectivity to ammonia as compared to acetone and ethanol at room temperature. Moreover, the lowest detection limit was 1×10−6, which demonstrates excellent ammonia sensing characteristics of the synthesized ZnO.