We report on the NO gas sensing properties of non-directional ZnO nanofibers synthesized using a typical electrospinning technique. These non-directional ZnO nanofibers were electrospun on an SiO2/Si substrate from a solution containing poly vinyl alcohol (PVA) and zinc nitrate hexahydrate dissolved in distilled water. Calcination processing of the ZnO/PVA composite nanofibers resulted in a random network of polycrystalline ZnO nanofibers of 50 nm to 100 nm in diameter. The diameter of the nanofibers was found to depend primarily on the solution viscosity; a proper viscosity was maintained by adding PVA to fabricate uniform ZnO nanofibers. Microstructural measurements using scanning electron microscopy revealed that our synthesized ZnO nanofibers after calcination had coarser surface morphology than those before calcination, indicating that the calcination processing was sufficient to remove organic contents. From the gas sensing response measurements for various NO gas concentrations in dry air at several working temperatures, it was found that gas sensors based on electrospun ZnO nanofibers showed quite good responses, exhibiting a maximum sensitivity to NO gas in dry air at an operating temperature of 200˚C. In particular, the non-directional electrospun ZnO nanofiber gas sensors were found to have a good NO gas detection limit of sub-ppm levels in dry air. These results illustrate that non-directional electrospun ZnO nanofibers are promising for use in low-cost, high-performance practical NO gas sensors.

• 김옥길 | Kim, Ok-Kil
• 김효진 | 김효진
• 김도진 | 김도진