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Novel Sensors Based on Metal Oxide Films and Structures

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A special issue of Sensors (ISSN 1424-8220). This special issue belongs to the section "Chemical Sensors".

Deadline for manuscript submissions: closed (20 May 2018) | Viewed by 28641

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Special Issue Editor

Prof. Dr. Laszlo B. Kish

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Guest Editor

Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering, College Station, Texas A&M University, College Station, TX 77843, USA
Interests: physical informatics; sensors; unconditional security;nanomaterials/structures; aging/degradation; percolation; fluctuation-enhanced sensing; noise-based computation; thermal demons/engines
Special Issues, Collections and Topics in MDPI journals

Special Issue Information

Dear Colleagues,

Metal-oxide sensors began with Taguchi sensors, which have had widespread practical applications. However, they have limited sensitivity, selectivity, durability and lifetime and, because they have to operate at high temperatures, their power consumption is significant. All these features make their application in classical electronic noses less than favorable.

Thanks to advances in nanotechnology, material science/processing, sensor signal processing and sensor excitation techniques over the last two decades, there has been progressive development in the field. This success, however, has brought new challenges that are topics of intensive research. Therefore, we decided to launch this Special Issue to provide a snapshot of this exciting progress.

We welcome research papers, reviews, and current opinions (short notes on a topic by an expert) addressing the subject matter. For a non-exhaustive list of topics of interest see the keywords.

Prof. Dr. Laszlo B. Kish
Guest Editor

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Keywords

thin and thick films
nanoparticles and nanostructures
sensing at various temperatures
low power consumption
response-time enhancements
memory, aging, degradation
fluctuation-enhanced sensing
multiple-gas sensing, identifying gas mixtures
UV and light induced effects
impact of humidity
sensor poisoning effects
role of geometry and size
electronic noses and tongues
applications: breath analysis, biomedicine, food safety, forensics
etc.

Published Papers (6 papers)

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Research

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15 pages, 4304 KiB

Open AccessArticle

Comparison between Different Structures of Suspended-Core Microstructured Optical Fibers for Volatiles Sensing

by Diego Lopez-Torres, Aitor Lopez-Aldaba, Cesar Elosua, Jean L. Auguste, Rapahel Jamier, Philippe Roy, Manuel Lopez-Amo and Francisco J. Arregui

Sensors 2018, 18(8), 2523; https://doi.org/10.3390/s18082523 - 02 Aug 2018

Cited by 11 | Viewed by 2965

Abstract

In this paper, different core structures of microstructured optical fibers (MOFs) for low-finesse Fabry–Pérot (FP) sensors are experimentally compared to get the highest sensitivity. These devices are designed for volatile organic compounds (VOCs) measurements. Indium tin oxide (ITO) thin films were deposited by sputtering on the MOFs and different optical fast Fourier transform (FFT) phase responses from the FP were measured for saturated atmospheres of ethanol. It has been demonstrated that the sensitivities of the developed sensors depend strongly on the geometry and the dimensions of the MOF-cores. The sensors show recovery times shorter than 100 s and the baselines are fully recovered after every exposure to ethanol vapors. Full article

(This article belongs to the Special Issue Novel Sensors Based on Metal Oxide Films and Structures)

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8 pages, 2114 KiB

Open AccessArticle

Improving the Performance of an SPR Biosensor Using Long-Range Surface Plasmon of Ga-Doped Zinc Oxide

by Banxian Ruan, Qi You, Jiaqi Zhu, Leiming Wu, Jun Guo, Xiaoyu Dai and Yuanjiang Xiang

Sensors 2018, 18(7), 2098; https://doi.org/10.3390/s18072098 - 30 Jun 2018

Cited by 34 | Viewed by 5539

Abstract

Transparent conducting oxides (TCOs) have appeared in the past few years as potential plasmonic materials for the development of optical devices in the near infrared regime (NIR). However, the performance of biosensors with TCOs has been limited in sensitivity and figure of merit (FOM). To improve the performance of the biosensors with TCOs, a biosensor based on long-range surface plasmon with Ga-doped zinc oxide (GZO) is proposed. It is shown that a larger FOM with a 2~7 times enhancement compared to the traditional surface plasmon polaritons (SPPs) sensor and higher detection accuracy (DA) can be realized in our proposed sensor compared with the surface plasmon resonance (SPR) sensor with GZO. Therefore, this sensor can be used to detect biological activity or chemical reactions in the near infrared region. Full article

(This article belongs to the Special Issue Novel Sensors Based on Metal Oxide Films and Structures)

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10 pages, 21591 KiB

Open AccessArticle

A Novel Nanowire Assembly Process for the Fabrication of CO Sensor

by Biyao Cheng, Shuming Yang, Tao Liu and Ali Vazinishayan

Sensors 2018, 18(4), 1234; https://doi.org/10.3390/s18041234 - 17 Apr 2018

Cited by 4 | Viewed by 4268

Abstract

Nanowires have been widely studied due to their outstanding mechanical and electrical properties; however, their practical applications are limited to the lack of an effective technique for controlled assembly. In the present work, zinc oxide (ZnO) nanowire arrays were assembled via a combing process using a makeup brush and the nanodevice was fabricated. The current–voltage (I–V) and ultraviolet (UV) characteristics of the device indicate stable and repeatable electrical properties. The carbon monoxide (CO) sensing properties were tested at operating temperatures of 200, 300 and 400 °C. It was found that ZnO based sensor exhibited the highest sensitivity to CO at 300 °C due to the change of dominant oxygen species. Comparing with others result, the sensitivity of the fabricated sensor exhibits higher sensing performance. The sensing mechanism of the CO sensor is also discussed. Full article

(This article belongs to the Special Issue Novel Sensors Based on Metal Oxide Films and Structures)

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14 pages, 4345 KiB

Open AccessArticle

The Effect of Zeolite Composition and Grain Size on Gas Sensing Properties of SnO₂/Zeolite Sensor

by Yanhui Sun, Jing Wang, Xiaogan Li, Haiying Du, Qingpan Huang and Xiaofeng Wang

Sensors 2018, 18(2), 390; https://doi.org/10.3390/s18020390 - 29 Jan 2018

Cited by 26 | Viewed by 5594

Abstract

In order to improve the sensing properties of tin dioxide gas sensor, four kinds of different SiO₂/Al₂O₃ ratio, different particle size of MFI type zeolites (ZSM-5) were coated on the SnO₂ to prepared zeolite modified gas sensors, and the gas sensing properties were tested. The measurement results showed that the response values of ZSM-5 zeolite (SiO₂/Al₂O₃ = 70, grain size 300 nm) coated SnO₂ gas sensors to formaldehyde vapor were increased, and the response to acetone decreased compared with that of SnO₂ gas sensor, indicating an improved selectivity property. The other three ZSM-5 zeolites with SiO₂/Al₂O₃ 70, 150 and 470, respectively, and grain sizes all around 1 μm coated SnO₂ sensors did not show much difference with SnO₂ sensor for the response properties to both formaldehyde and acetone. The sensing mechanism of ZSM-5 modified sensors was briefly analyzed. Full article

(This article belongs to the Special Issue Novel Sensors Based on Metal Oxide Films and Structures)

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10 pages, 3356 KiB

Open AccessArticle

AuNPs Hybrid Black ZnO Nanorods Made by a Sol-Gel Method for Highly Sensitive Humidity Sensing

by Hongyan Zhang, Min Zhang, Cunchong Lin and Jun Zhang

Sensors 2018, 18(1), 218; https://doi.org/10.3390/s18010218 - 13 Jan 2018

Cited by 20 | Viewed by 4298

Abstract

A highly sensitive self-powered humidity sensor has been realized from AuNPs hybrid black zinc oxide (ZnO) nanorods prepared through a sol-gel method. XRD pattern reveals that both ZnO and ZnO/AuNPs exhibit a wurtzite structure. ZnO/AuNPs nanorods grow in a vertical alignment, which possesses high uniformity and forms dense arrays with a smaller diameter than that of ZnO nanoparticles. All ZnO/AuNPs and pure black ZnO show lower band gap energy than the typically reported 3.34 eV of pure ZnO. Furthermore, the band gap of ZnO/AuNPs nanocomposites is effectively influenced by the amount of AuNPs. The humidity sensing tests clearly prove that all the ZnO/AuNPs humidity sensors exhibit much higher response than that of ZnO sensors, and the sensitivity of such ZnO/AuNPs nanorods (6 mL AuNPs) display a change three orders higher than that of pure ZnO with relative humidity (RH) ranging from 11% to 95% at room temperature. The response and recovery time of the ZnO/AuNPs are 5.6 s and 32.4 s, respectively. This study of the construction of semiconductor/noble metal sensors provides a rational way to control the morphology of semiconductor nanomaterials and to design a humidity sensor with high performance. Full article

(This article belongs to the Special Issue Novel Sensors Based on Metal Oxide Films and Structures)

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Review

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17 pages, 2316 KiB

Open AccessReview

An Overview of High-k Oxides on Hydrogenated-Diamond for Metal-Oxide-Semiconductor Capacitors and Field-Effect Transistors

by Jiangwei Liu and Yasuo Koide

Sensors 2018, 18(6), 1813; https://doi.org/10.3390/s18061813 - 04 Jun 2018

Cited by 14 | Viewed by 5331

Abstract

Thanks to its excellent intrinsic properties, diamond is promising for applications of high-power electronic devices, ultraviolet detectors, biosensors, high-temperature tolerant gas sensors, etc. Here, an overview of high-k oxides on hydrogenated-diamond (H-diamond) for metal-oxide-semiconductor (MOS) capacitors and MOS field-effect transistors (MOSFETs) is demonstrated. Fabrication routines for the H-diamond MOS capacitors and MOSFETs, band configurations of oxide/H-diamond heterointerfaces, and electrical properties of the MOS and MOSFETs are summarized and discussed. High-k oxide insulators are deposited using atomic layer deposition (ALD) and sputtering deposition (SD) techniques. Electrical properties of the H-diamond MOS capacitors with high-k oxides of ALD-Al₂O₃, ALD-HfO₂, ALD-HfO₂/ALD-Al₂O₃ multilayer, SD-HfO₂/ALD-HfO₂ bilayer, SD-TiO₂/ALD-Al₂O₃ bilayer, and ALD-TiO₂/ALD-Al₂O₃ bilayer are discussed. Analyses for capacitance-voltage characteristics of them show that there are low fixed and trapped charge densities for the ALD-Al₂O₃/H-diamond and SD-HfO₂/ALD-HfO₂/H-diamond MOS capacitors. The k value of 27.2 for the ALD-TiO₂/ALD-Al₂O₃ bilayer is larger than those of the other oxide insulators. Drain-source current versus voltage curves show distinct pitch-off and p-type channel characteristics for the ALD-Al₂O₃/H-diamond, SD-HfO₂/ALD-HfO₂/H-diamond, and ALD-TiO₂/ALD-Al₂O₃/H-diamond MOSFETs. Understanding of fabrication routines and electrical properties for the high-k oxide/H-diamond MOS electronic devices is meaningful for the fabrication of high-performance H-diamond MOS capacitor and MOSFET gas sensors. Full article

(This article belongs to the Special Issue Novel Sensors Based on Metal Oxide Films and Structures)

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