Highly stable and sensitive humidity sensors based on quartz crystal microbalance coated with bacterial cellulose membrane

A novel highly stable and sensitive humidity sensor based on bacterial cellulose (BC) coated quartz crystal microbalance (QCM) has been successfully fabricated. The results showed that the sensors possessed good sensing characteristics by increasing more than two orders of magnitude with increasing relative humidity (RH) from 5 to 97%, and the Log(Δf) showed good linearity (20–97% RH). The sensitivity of sensors coated with BC membranes was four times higher than that of the corresponding cellulose membranes at 97% RH. In addition, the sensor sensitivity is greatly enhanced by increasing the coating load of the BC membranes with more absorption sites in the sensing membranes. Moreover, the experimental results prove that the resultant sensors exhibited a good reversible behavior and good long term stability. Herein, not only a novel and low-cost humidity sensor material was exploited, but also a new application area for BC nanofibrous membranes was opened up.