Synthesis, characterization and acetone gas sensing applications of Ag-doped ZnO nanoneedles

Herein, we report the simple synthesis, characterization and acetone gas sensing applications of Ag-doped ZnO nanoneedles prepared by facile hydrothermal method. The synthesized nanoneedles were characterized through different characterization techniques to examine its crystallinity, phase structure, morphological, compositional, optical, vibrational and gas sensing properties. The detailed morphological studies revealed that the Ag-doped ZnO nanoneedles are assembled into non-homogeneously distributed flower-shaped structures which are grown in high density. Further characterizations confirmed that the synthesized nanoneedles are pure, possessing well-crystallinity and exhibiting good optical and vibrational properties. The synthesized Ag-doped ZnO nanoneedles were used as functional material to fabricate high sensitive acetone gas sensors. The effect of operating temperature and concentration of the acetone were analyzed for detailed sensing performance of synthesized nanoneedles. By detailed sensing experiments, the response and recovery times of 10 s and 21 s, respectively were calculated at acetone concentration of 100 ppm at an optimized operating temperature of 370 °C. A maximum sensitivity of 30.233 was recorded at 370 °C operating temperature for 200 ppm of acetone for the fabricated acetone sensor based on Ag-doped ZnO nanoneedles.