Sensors and Actuators B 153 (2011) 170–175
Contents lists available at ScienceDirect
Sensors and Actuators B: Chemical
journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/snb
Hydrothermal synthesis of hollow ZnSnO
3
microspheres and sensing properties
toward butane
Huitao Fan, Yi Zeng, Xiujuan Xu, Ning Lv, Tong Zhang
∗
State Key Laboratory on Integrated Optoelectronics, College of Electronic Science and Engineering, Jilin University, Changchun 130012, PR China
article info
Article history:
Received 30 June 2010
Received in revised form 5 October 2010
Accepted 18 October 2010
Available online 25 October 2010
Keywords:
Hollow microspheres
Sensor
Hydrothermal method
ZnSnO
3
abstract
Hollow ZnSnO
3
microspheres were successfully prepared by hydrothermal method at 160
◦
C for 12 h.
The prepared material was characterized by field emission scanning electron microscope (FESEM), trans-
mission electron microscope (TEM) and X-ray diffraction measurements (XRD). The average diameter of
the hollow ZnSnO
3
microspheres was in the range of 400–600 nm. Compared with solid ZnSnO
3
micro-
spheres structure, the hollow ZnSnO
3
microspheres showed better response (S) to butane. To 500 ppm
butane, the sensor response (S) of the hollow ZnSnO
3
microspheres was 5.79 at the optimum operating
temperature of 380
◦
C, and the response and recovery time were 0.3 s and 0.65 s, respectively. The sen-
sitivities of sensors based on this material were linear with the concentration of butane in the range of
100–1000 ppm.
© 2010 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.
1. Introduction
Butane is an inflammable, colorless, and an easily liquefiable
gas, which is very important for the development of petrochemical
industry, organic materials. And butane leak happens sometimes,
which give harms to the survival and health of mankind. When the
volume ratio of butane in the mixture gas of butane and air is in the
range of 1.6–8.5%, explosion will happen. When the concentration
of butane in the air reaches 800 ppm, human beings will feel nausea,
dizziness and even syncope. Since butane is widely used and has
direct impact on health, the study of butane sensitive materials is
very necessary.
Over the past years, the controlled synthesis of hollow func-
tional materials like micro/nanospheres has attracted much
attention due to their unique structures such as low density,
high specific surface area, as well as their potential application
in chemical sensors [1–3]. So far, various strategies, including
template-assisted, Ostwald ripening, and the Kirkendall effect,
have been employed successfully to fabricate hollow spheres of
semiconductor oxides [4–6]. Zinc stannate (ZnSnO
3
), has drawn
considerable attention due to its potential applications in gas-
sensing [7–10]. Besides structure, the controlled synthesis of
various shapes of ZnSnO
3
crystals allows some researchers to tailor
its physical and chemical properties for the practical applications
of functional materials with good sensor response and selectivity.
∗
Corresponding author. Tel.: +86 431 85168385; fax: +86 431 85168270.
E-mail address: zhangtong@jlu.edu.cn (T. Zhang).
Several methods including low-temperature ion exchange,
coprecipitation, low temperature solution-phase synthesis, and
hydrothermal methods have been used to fabricate various mor-
phologies of ZnSnO
3
crystals [7,8,11–13]. Nevertheless, these
synthesis processes usually involve complicated controlling pro-
cess, costly raw materials, and long synthesized time, which result
in the limitation of the potential applications. Thus, there is still
a challenge to prepare the ZnSnO
3
micro/nanostructures with the
enhanced sensing performance through a simple synthesis proce-
dure.
In our previous work, hierarchical ZnSnO
3
nanocages and
nanoskeletons were successfully prepared using the simple
surfactant-assisted hydrothermal processes [13,14]. Excellent
ethanol and formaldehyde (HCHO) sensing properties of sensors
based on these hollow ZnSnO
3
nanostructures have been observed.
Herein, we report the synthesis and gas-sensing properties of
another hollow structure of ZnSnO
3
microspheres, which is com-
posed of many nanoparticles and short nanorods. We studied the
sensor response (S) of hollow ZnSnO
3
microspheres to butane for
the first time. The results showed that this material has rapid
response and recovery time.
2. Experimental
2.1. Preparation of ZnSnO
3
microspheres
ZnSnO
3
microspheres were prepared via one step hydrothermal
process. All the reagents, purchased from Beijing Chemicals Co. Ltd.,
were analytic grade reagents and used without further purification.
0925-4005/$ – see front matter © 2010 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.
doi:10.1016/j.snb.2010.10.026