Single-crystal zinc oxide nanorods with nanovoids as highly sensitive NO2 nanosensors

• Design and synthesis of nanostructured materials with a highly porous crystal structure and high specific surface area are the key issues to an enhanced gas sensing performance. This letter introduces a simple and scalable hydrothermal method to fabricate single-crystal ZnO nanorods (NRs) with nanovoids (NVs) for highly sensitive NO2 nanosensors. The fabricated ZnO NRs have a single-crystal structure with an average length and diameter of about 900 nm and 23 nm, respectively. NVs of less than 5 nm size are found frequently along the NRs. Gas-sensing characterizations revealed that the ZnO NR sensors exhibited a relatively high response to sub-ppm NO2 with excellent stability after 8 cycles of switching from NO2 to dry air without significant response reduction.

Keyword

Nanosensors

NO2

NVs

ZnO NRs

Teknisk fysik med inriktning mot mikrosystemteknik

Engineering Science with specialization in Microsystems Technology

Publication and Content Type

ref (subject category)

art (subject category)