CdS nanowires with PbS nanoparticles surface coating as room temperature liquefied petroleum gas sensor

•Preparation of p-PbS/n-CdS nano-heterojunction by using room temperature chemical method.•Room temperature LPG sensor structure based on p-PbS/n-CdS nano-heterojunction.•Gas response with relatively fast response and recovery times to liquefied petroleum gas from p-PbS/n-CdS nano-heterojunction.

Room temperature chemical method was used to surface coat PbS nanoparticles onto CdS nanowires to get high surface area nano-heterojunction. This high surface architecture was exposed to sense liquefied petroleum gas (LPG) at room temperature (27 °C) which is an advantage to adsorb and de-adsorb LPG molecules easily by penetrating from top to bottom. At room temperature, the formed nano-heterojunction exhibited gas response more than 60% upon 1200 ppm exposure to of LPG with faster response and recovery time as 120 and 105 s, respectively. The formed device showed stable response of 93% for 10 days.