Surface Plasmon Resonance Amplified Efficient Polarization-Selective Volatile Organic Compounds CdSe-CdS/Ag/PMMA Sensing Material

Abstract Volatile organic compounds (VOCs) are potentially dangerous to the environment and human health. The developed sensing template in this study was prepared by a one-step process on a glass substrate using the electrospinning technique. The sensing material made of the uniaxial aligned CdSe-CdS/Ag/PMMA composite scaffold consists of CdSe-CdS core-shell quantum rods, silver nanoparticles (Ag NPs), and poly(methyl methacrylate) (PMMA) nanofibers. Increasing the specific surface area is beneficial for VOCs harvesting; therefore, the uniaxial aligned CdSe-CdS/Ag/PMMA composite scaffold was slightly treated with UV-ozone etching, and thus efficiently enhancing the extinction changes of VOCs. Also, a high VOC detection capability was demonstrated by the polarization response and Ag surface plasmon resonance of the nanocomposite. A series of typical VOCs and alcoholic VOCs were used for the VOCs sensor practical tests. This VOC sensor achieved a spectacular detection limit of 100 ppm for butanol and 500 ppm for chlorobenzene. The uniaxial aligned CdSe-CdS/Ag/PMMA composite scaffold is a newly designed nanocomposite and can reach the market demands comparing to other commercial high sensitive VOC sensors.