Sr- and Ni-doping in ZnO nanorods synthesized by simple wet chemical method as excellent materials for CO and CO2 gas sensing

摘要

In this study, the effect of Sr- and Ni-doping on microstructural,morphological and sensing properties of ZnO nanorods has been investigated.Nanorods with different Sr and Ni loadings were prepared using a simple wetchemical method and characterized by means of scanning electron microscopy(SEM), X-ray diffraction (XRD) and photoluminescence (PL) analysis. XRD dataconfirmed that Sr- and Ni-doped samples maintainsthe wurtzite hexagonalstructure of pure ZnO. However, unlikes Sr, Ni doping modifies the nanorodmorphology, increases the surface area (SA) and decreases the ratio ofIUV/Igreen photoluminescence peak to a greater extent. Sensing tests wereperformed on thick films resistive planar devices for monitoring CO and CO2, asindicators of indoor air quality.The effect of the operating temperature,nature and loading of dopant on the sensibility and selectivity of thefabricated sensors towards these two harmful gases were investigated. The gassensing characteristics of Ni- and Sr-doped ZnO based sensors showed aremarkable enhancement (i. e. the response increased and shifted towards lowertemperature for both gases) compared to ZnO-based one, demonstrating that theseZnO nanostructures are promising to fabricate sensor devices for monitoringindoor air quality.