Fe2O3 nanoparticles-decorated MoO3 nanobelts for enhanced chemiresistive gas sensing

Abstract In this study, we report the fabrication of high-performance gas sensor based on a heterojunction structure in which Fe 2 O 3 nanoparticles were used to decorate MoO 3 nanobelts. The pure MoO 3 nanobelts exhibited a response to 100 parts per million (ppm) of xylene (ratio of resistance to air and gas = 9.08), with no obviously lower cross-responses to 100 ppm of ethanol, acetone, benzene, toluene, methanol and butanol. Compared with pristine MoO 3 nanobelts, Fe 2 O 3 nanoparticles decorated nanobelts demonstrated about 2–4 times higher response toward xylene. The enhanced sensing properties of Fe 2 O 3 nanoparticles-decorated MoO 3 heterostructured nanobelts can be attributed to the formation of heterojunction between Fe 2 O 3 and MoO 3 . These results, combined with other reported literature, indicate that controlled engineering of surface loading/decorating is an effective strategy for designing highly sensitive and selective semiconducting metal oxide based gas sensors.