Abstract
Novel polypyrrole/titanium oxide (PPy/TiO2) hybrid sensors were fabricated by an in situ chemical oxidation polymerization approach. The structural and morphological information of the sensing films were analyzed through X-ray diffraction, atomic force microscopy and Raman analysis. The huge surface area (121 m2/g) and highly porous nature (15–20 nm) of the PPy/TiO2 composite film was identified via a N2 adsorption–desorption analysis. The resistance-type gas sensors were fabricated and monitored CO2 and H2 gases with different ppm levels. The results revealed that PPy/TiO2 composite film sensors showed a tremendous gas-sensing response (66%), and fast response (19 s) and recovery times (27 s) with long-term stability. The sensing characteristics were further monitored using different voltaic gases like NH3, NO2, LPG and SO2, etc., and the sensors exhibited good selectivity and a higher response towards H2 gas than other gas spices. The proposed sensors are a promising material for application in the hydrogen gas sensor industries. The sensing mechanism is also elaborated and discussed.
Similar content being viewed by others
References
C.J. Docherty, C.T. Lin, H.J. Joyce, R.J. Nichola, L.M. Herz, L.J. Li, M.B. Johnston, Extreme sensitivity of graphene photoconductivity to environmental gases. Nat. Commun. 3, 1228 (2012)
Y. Yan, C. Wladyka, J. Fujii, S. Sockanathan, Prdx4 is a compartment-specific H2O2 sensor that regulates neurogenesis by controlling surface expression of GDE2. Nat. Commun. 6, 7006 (2015)
P. Lehner, C. Staudinger, S.M. Borisov, I. Klimant, Ultra-sensitive optical oxygen sensors for characterization of nearly anoxic systems. Nat. Commun. 5, 4460 (2014)
J. Ma, L. Mei, Y. Chen, Q. Li, T. Wang, Z. Xu, X. Duan, W. Zheng, α-Fe2O3 nanochains: ammonium acetate-based ionothermal synthesis and ultrasensitive sensors for low-ppm-level H2S gas. Nanoscale 3, 895–898 (2013)
S. Xu, J. Gao, L. Wang, K. Kan, Y. Xie, P. Shen, L. Li, K. Shi, Role of the heterojunctions in In2O3-composite SnO2 nanorod sensors and their remarkable gas-sensing performance for NOx at room temperature. Nanoscale 7, 14643–14651 (2015)
M.W.G. Hoffmann, J.D. Prades, L. Mayrhofer, F. Hernandez-Ramirez, T.T. Järvi, M. Moseler, A. Waag, H. Shen, Highly selective SAM-nanowire hybrid NO2 sensor: insight into charge transfer dynamics and alignment of frontier molecular orbitals. Adv. Funct. Mater. 24, 595–602 (2014)
E.R. Leite, I.T. Weber, E. Longo, J.A. Varela, A new method to control particle size and particle size distribution of SnO2 nanoparticles for gas sensor applications. Adv. Mater. 12, 965–968 (2000)
J. Liu, X. Wang, Q. Peng, Y. Li, Vanadium pentoxide nanobelts: highly selective and stable ethanol sensor materials. Adv. Mater. 17, 764–767 (2005)
N. Izu, G. Hagen, D. Schönauer, U. Röder-Roith, R. Moos, Application of V2O5/WO3/TiO2 for resistive-type SO2 sensors. Sensors 11, 2982–2991 (2011)
W. Weppner, Solid-state electrochemical gas sensor. Sens. Actuators 12, 107–119 (1987)
N. Miura, M. Nakatou, S. Zhuiykov, Impedancemetric gas sensor based on zirconia solid electrolyte and oxide sensing electrode for detecting total NOx at high temperature. Sens. Actuators B Chem. 93, 221–228 (2003)
G.S. Kulkarni, K. Reddy, Z. Zhong, X. Fan, Graphene nanoelectronic heterodyne sensor for rapid and sensitive vapour detection. Nat. Commun. 5, 4376 (2014)
S. Borini, R. White, D. Wei, M. Astley, S. Haque, E. Spigone, N. Harris, J. Kivioja, T. Ryhanen, Ultrafast graphene oxide humidity sensors. ACS Nano 7, 11166–11173 (2013)
Z. Chen, A. Umar, S. Wang, Y. Wang, T. Tian, Y. Shang, Y. Fan, Q. Qi, D. Xu, L. Jiang, Supramolecular fabrication of multilevel graphene-based gas sensors with high NO2 sensibility. Nanoscale 7, 10259–10266 (2015)
V.E. Bochenkov, G.B. Sergeev, Sensitivity, selectivity, and stability of gas-sensitive metal-oxide nanostructures, in Metal Oxide Nanostructures and Their Applications, ed. by A. Umar, Y.-B. Hahn (American Scientific, Cambridge, 2010), pp. 31–52
R. Frua, H. Kawasaki, G.W. Harrison, P. Wima, Preparation of high quality nitrogen doped TiO2 thin film as a photo catalyst using a pulsed laser deposition method. Thin Solid Films 162, 453–454 (2004)
L.M. Doeswijka, H.H.C. de Moorb, H. Rogallaa, D.H.A. Blanka, Exploring the deposition of oxides on silicon for photovoltaic cells by pulsed laser deposition. Appl. Surf. Sci. 186, 453–457 (2002)
L. Zhang, K. Zhao, W. Xu, Integrated SnO2 nanorod array with polypyrrole coverage for high-rate and long-life lithium batteries. Phys. Chem. Chem. Phys. 17(2015), 7619–7623 (2015)
R.K. Sharma, A.C. Rastogi, S.B. Desu, Manganese oxide embedded polypyrrole nanocomposites for electrochemical supercapacitor. Electrochim. Acta 53, 7690–7695 (2008)
A.C. Sonavane, A.I. Inamdar, D.S. Dalavi, H.P. Deshmukh, P.S. Patil, Simple and rapid synthesis of NiO/PPy thin films with improved electrochromic performance. Electrochim. Acta 55, 2344–2351 (2010)
K. Dutta, P.P. Chattopadhyay, C.W. Lu, M.S. Ho, P. Bhattacharyya, A highly sensitive BTX sensor based on electrochemically derived wall connected TiO2 nanotubes. Appl. Surf. Sci. 354, 353–361 (2015)
S. Pandey, Highly sensitive and selective chemiresistor gas/vapor sensors based on polyaniline nanocomposite: a comprehensive review. J. Sci. Adv. Mater. Dev. 1, 431–453 (2016)
D.E. Park, H.S. Chae, H.J. Choi, A. Maity, Magnetite–polypyrrole core–shell structured microspheres and their dual stimuli-response under electric and magnetic fields. J. Mater. Chem. C 3, 3150–3158 (2015)
M. Parthibavarman, K. Vallalperuman, S. Sathishkumar, M. Durairaj, K. Thavamani, A novel microwave synthesis of nanocrystalline SnO2 and its structural optical and dielectric properties. J. Mater. Sci. Mater. Electron. 25, 730–735 (2014)
S. Biswas, L.T. Drzal, Multilayered nanoarchitecture of graphene nanosheets and polypyrrole nanowires for high performance supercapacitor electrodes. Chem. Mater. 22, 5667–5671 (2010)
F. Li, Y. Gu, Improvement of performance of dye-sensitized solar cells by doping Er2O3 into TiO2 electrodes. Mater. Sci. Semicond. Process. 15(15), 11–14 (2012)
R. Boopathi Raja, M. Parthibavarman, A. Nishara Begum, Hydrothermal induced novel CuCo2O4 electrode for high performance supercapacitor applications. Vacuum 165, 96–104 (2019)
R. BoopathiRaja, M. Parthibavarman, Hetero-structure arrays of MnCo2O4 nanoflakes@ nanowires grown on Ni foam: design, fabrication and applications in electrochemical energy storage. J. Alloy. Compd. 811, 152084 (2019)
K. Kowal, K.W.K.M. Kopaczynska, E. Dworniczek, R. Franiczek, M. Wawrzynska, M. Vargova, M. Zahoran, E. Rakovsky, P. Kus, G. Plesch, In-situ photoexcitation of silver-doped titania nanopowders for activity against bacteria and yeasts. J. Colloid Interface Sci. 362, 50–57 (2011)
E.T. Kang, K.G. Neoh, Y.K. Ong, K.L. Tan, B.T.G. Tan, XPS studies of proton modification and some anion exchange processes in polypyrrole. Synth. Met. 30, 69–80 (1990)
Y. Qiao, L. Shen, M. Wu, Y. Guo, Y. Meng, A novel chemical synthesis of bowl-shaped polypyrrole particles. Mater. Lett. 126, 185–188 (2014)
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Additional information
Publisher's Note
Springer Nature remains neutral with regard to jurisdictional claims in published maps and institutional affiliations.
Rights and permissions
About this article
Cite this article
Kumaresan, M., Venkatachalam, M., Saroja, M. et al. Significant enhancement in the hydrogen-sensing performance of polypyrrole/titanium oxide (PPy/TiO2) hybrid sensors by a chemical oxidation polymerization approach. J Mater Sci: Mater Electron 31, 8183–8193 (2020). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10854-020-03353-3
Received:
Accepted:
Published:
Issue Date:
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10854-020-03353-3