High-performance chemiresistor-type NH3 gas sensor based on three-dimensional reduced graphene oxide/polyaniline hybrid.

In this study, a novel gas sensor is proposed based on a three-dimensional reduced graphene oxide/polyaniline (3D RGO/PANI) hybrid, which is synthesized by a hydrothermal method for detecting NH3 gas at room temperature. The 3D RGO/PANI hybrid is characterized by field emission-scanning electron microscopy, Fourier transform infrared and x-ray diffraction. The specific surface area is analyzed using the Brunauer-Emmett-Teller (BET) equation. The as-synthesized sensing materials with an appropriate amount of polyaniline nanowires (PANI-NWs) can effectively prevent aggregation of the neighboring graphene sheets and directly act as adsorption sites for NH3 molecules. In comparison with its pure 3D RGO counterpart, the 3D RGO/PANI (1:1) hybrid exhibits 44.7 times enhanced response to 100 ppm NH3, suggesting the remarkable effect of PANI-NWs in improving the sensitivity. This work gives new insights into boosting the sensitivity and selectivity of detecting NH3 gas by incorporating PANI-NWs into 3D RGO.