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Experimental and theoretical investigation of palladium-doped zinc oxide nanorods for NO2 gas sensor

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Abstract

The high concentration of nitrogen dioxide (NO2) gets it one of the most popular and harmful air pollutants. This work examines the NO2 gas sensing properties of palladium-doped zinc oxide (Pd-ZnO) nanorods. The Pd-ZnO nanorods were synthesized by chemical hydrothermal method with different Pd doping concentrations (0–1 wt%). The Pd-ZnO nanorods were characterized by XRD, FESEM, and XPS for their structural and morphological properties, respectively. The ZnO nanostructures show hexagonal structures, and XRD and XPS results confirmed the doping of Pd on ZnO nanostructures. The Pd (1 wt%)-ZnO nanorods-based sensor shows high response of 22.1 with response/recovery time of 67/118 s toward 100 ppm NO2, while it exhibits a response of 7 with response/recovery times of 80/145 s for 1 ppm NO2, at 200 °C. The sensor is observed very selective for NO2 compared to other gases like carbon monoxide (CO), ammonia (NH3), and hydrogen (H2). The sensor has strong stability for a longer time (35 days) in a dry and humid (RH 60%) environment. The mechanism of gas sensors is further explained by the Crowell-Sze model in Finite-Difference Time-Domain (FDTD) simulation using COMSOL Multiphysics using drift Diffusion-Poisson equations to simulate the electric potential distribution in the nanorods during the gas sensing.

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The data that support the findings of this study are available from the corresponding author, upon reasonable request.

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Acknowledgements

The authors would like to thank to Prof. Ramesh Chandra, IIC, IIT Roorkee, and India for providing FESEM & XRD facilities. The authors would like to thank CCS University Meerut [(DEV/URGS/2022-23/39)] for supporting this research work. Author Mr. Durvesh Gautam also thank to CSIR-SRF (1620/CSIR NET June 2019) New Delhi, India. Dr. Ashwani Kumar extends sincere appreciation to CSIR-SRA (Pool Scientist), New Delhi, for their generous financial support (Grant No. 13(9131)-A/2020-Pool), which facilitated the completion of this research endeavor.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Smart Materials and Sensor Laboratory, Department of Physics, CCS University Campus Meerut, Meerut, Uttar Pradesh, 250004, India

    Anit Kumar Ambedkar, Durvesh Gautam, Manohar Singh, Sagar Vikal, Beer Pal Singh, Anil K. Malik & Yogendra K. Gautam

  2. Department of Materials Science and Engineering, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, Urbana, IL, 61801, USA

    Sung Bum Kang

  3. Institute Instrumentation Centre, Indian Institute of Technology Roorkee, Roorkee, Uttrakhand, 247667, India

    Ashwani Kumar

  4. Department of Physics, Graphic Era (Deemed to Be University), Dehradun, Uttarakhand, 248002, India

    Ashwani Kumar

  5. Department of Physics, Netaji Subhas University of Technology, Dwarka Sector-3, New Delhi, 110078, India

    Amit Sanger

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  1. Anit Kumar Ambedkar
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  2. Durvesh Gautam
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Contributions

AKA contributed toward investigation, and writing-original draft; DKG contributed toward methodology, and writing-review & editing; MS contributed toward writing-review & editing and resources; SV contributed toward conceptualization and methodology; BPS contributed toward investigation, and writing-review & editing; AKM contributed toward data curation, and software; SBK contributed toward software and formal analysis; AK contributed toward writing-original draft and supervision; AS contributed toward writing-review & editing and supervision; and YKG contributed toward resources, investigation, and supervision.

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Correspondence to Ashwani Kumar, Amit Sanger or Yogendra K. Gautam.

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Ambedkar, A.K., Gautam, D., Singh, M. et al. Experimental and theoretical investigation of palladium-doped zinc oxide nanorods for NO2 gas sensor. J Mater Sci: Mater Electron 34, 2213 (2023). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10854-023-11657-3

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