Spray synthesis of rapid recovery ZnO/polyaniline film ammonia sensor at room temperature

Abstract

As an excellent room temperature sensing material, polyaniline (PANI) needs to be further investigated in the field of high sensitivity and sustainable gas sensors due to its long recovery time and difficulty to complete recovery. The ZnO/PANI film with p‒n heterogeneous energy levels have successfully prepared by spraying ZnO nanorod synthesized by hydrothermal method on the PANI film rapidly synthesized at the gas‒liquid interface. The presence of p‒n heterogeneous energy levels enables the ZnO/PANI film to detect 0.1‒100 ppm (1 ppm = 10⁻⁶) NH₃ at room temperature with the response value to 100 ppm NH₃ doubled (12.96) and the recovery time shortened to 1/5 (31.2 s). The ability of high response and fast recovery makes the ZnO/PANI film to be able to detect NH₃ at room temperature continuously. It provides a new idea for PANI to prepare sustainable room temperature sensor and promotes the development of room temperature sensor in public safety.

Graphical abstract

Keywords

rapid recovery / ZnO/polyaniline film / ammonia sensor

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Acknowledgements

This work was supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (Grant Nos. 21771060 and 61271126), the International Science & Technology Cooperation Program of China (Grant No. 2016YFE0115100), the Program for Science and Technology Project of Heilongjiang Province (Grant No. JQ2021B002), the Heilongjiang Provincial Natural Science Foundation of China (Grant No. 2019LH0320), the Reform and Development Fund Project of Local University supported by the Central Government, Heilongjiang Touyan Innovation Team Program.

Electronic supplementary information

Supplementary materials can be found in the online version at https://doi.org/10.1007/s11706-022-0620-x.

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