Development of Yttrium-Cerium Oxide Gas Sensor for Low ppm Hydrogen Detection

Abstract

The hydrothermal method was successfully used in the current work to fabricate YCeO nanocomposites, a novel hydrogen (H2) gas sensor. XRD, FE-SEM, and AFM were performed to determine the crystal structure and morphology of as prepared nanocomposite. The cubic structure of space group Fm3m with a density of 6.74 gmcm−3, a volume of 157.81 106 pm3, and a crystallite size of 18.66 nm is obtained in the XRD pattern of YCeO in this instance. Furthermore, the granular structure and roughness of the surface can be seen in FE-SEM and AFM studies. Additionally, hydrogen sensing was performed at a temperature of 28 °C with a hydrogen concentration of 20–120 ppm. The sensor response for hydrogen gas at 20 and 120 ppm was measured to be 1.41 and 2.09, respectively. At 20 ppm, we came to know that the recovery times and rapid response were 75.54 s and 40.81 s, respectively. The long-term stability was also checked for 40 days and the change in sensor response at 20 and 40 days was 1.40 and 1.39, respectively. The investigated sensor device also demonstrates the benefits of a straightforward fabrication procedure, a basic structure, and a very affordable hydrogen detection sensor.

Keywords

• cerium oxide
• yttrium oxide
• nanocomposite
• morphology
• H₂ gas sensing
• mechanism