Highly sensitive room-temperature gas sensors based on hydrothermal synthesis of Cr2O3 hollow nanospheres

This paper reports that Cr2O3 hollow nanospheres (HNs) were synthesized via a hydrothermal approach and characterized by scanning electron microscopy, x-ray powder diffraction, transmission electron microscopy (TEM), selective area electron diffraction and high resolution TEM, respectively. In addition, the room-temperature (RT) gas sensing properties of Cr2O3 HNs and conventional powders (CPs) were investigated by means of the surface photovoltage technique. The experimental data demonstrate that the RT gas sensor of the as-fabricated HNs reaches below 5 ppm whereas that of the CPs is about 40 ppm, which results from there being much more adsorbed and desorbed oxygen in HNs than in CPs at RT. The as-prepared Cr2O3 HNs could have potential applications as RT nanosensors.