Chen Huijuan, Lv Li, Xue Kaifeng, Zhang Pinhua, Du Lulu, Cui Guangliang
School of Physics and Electrical Engineering, Linyi University, Linyi 276000, China.
ACS Sens. 2025 Apr 25;10(4):2579-2588. doi: 10.1021/acssensors.4c02989. Epub 2025 Apr 2.
Developing a portable and compact sensor for room temperature detection of HS in exhaled breath for health assessment presents considerable technical challenges. This work successfully synthesized CuO/ZnO heterostructures with excellent gas sensitivity to HS at room and lower temperatures using a two-dimensional (2D) electrodeposition in situ assembly method with the application of a semisine wave voltage as well as CuZnO nanoarrays deposited under direct current voltage. The CuO/ZnO heterostructure sensors, with high response of 8.53 × 10 to 1 ppm of HS and a minimum detection limit of 10 ppb at room temperature, exhibit a response of 42 for 10 ppm of HS even at -20 °C, and its response to 50 ppm of HS is approximately 3774 times greater than that of the CuZnO sensor, which is a significant challenge to achieve with sensors based on oxygen adsorption/desorption mechanisms. These outstanding gas-sensing properties are attributed to the formation of p-n heterojunctions in the CuO/ZnO heterostructures and the occurrence of the sulfuration reaction. In addition, we successfully employed the CuO/ZnO sensor to detect HS in human exhaled breath, offering valuable insights for the monitoring of various chronic diseases and new directions for the development of portable room-temperature breath sensors.
开发一种用于健康评估的便携式紧凑型传感器，以检测呼出气体中室温下的硫化氢，面临着相当大的技术挑战。这项工作通过应用半正弦波电压的二维（2D）电沉积原位组装方法以及在直流电压下沉积的CuZnO纳米阵列，成功合成了在室温和较低温度下对硫化氢具有优异气敏性的CuO/ZnO异质结构。CuO/ZnO异质结构传感器对1 ppm硫化氢的响应高达8.53×10，室温下最低检测限为10 ppb，即使在-20°C时对10 ppm硫化氢的响应也为42，其对50 ppm硫化氢的响应比CuZnO传感器大约高3774倍，这对于基于氧吸附/解吸机制的传感器来说是一项重大挑战。这些出色的气敏特性归因于CuO/ZnO异质结构中p-n异质结的形成以及硫化反应的发生。此外，我们成功地将CuO/ZnO传感器用于检测人体呼出气体中的硫化氢，为各种慢性疾病的监测提供了有价值的见解，并为便携式室温呼吸传感器的开发提供了新方向。
