Self-assembled peptide microtubes (SPMTs)/SnO sensors for enhanced room-temperature gas detection under visible light illumination.

Nitrogen dioxide (NO) is an important contaminant that poses a severe threat to environmental sustainability. Traditional inorganic NO gas detectors are generally used under harsh operating conditions and employ environmentally unfriendly resources, thus preventing widespread practical applications. Herein, self-assembled peptide microtubes (SPMTs) are combined with SnO nanoparticles (NPs) to develop a bioinspired NO gas sensor. The sensor incorporated with SPMTs exhibits a lower resistance and a stronger response under visible light irradiation. Under exposure to 4.7-mW/cm white light irradiation, the device exhibits a response of 412 and a resistance of only 97 MΩ, contrast to 318 and 340 MΩ for the bare SnO-based counterpart under the same test conditions. This work exemplifies the feasibility of using bioinspired approach employing peptides self-assembly strategy to engineer comprehensive pollution detectors, potentially enabling development in the environmentally friendly sensing field.