Combinational physical synthesis methodology and crystal features correlated with oxidizing gas detection ability of one-dimensional ZnO–VOx crystalline hybrids

Abstract

One-dimensional ZnO–V₂O₃ and ZnO–V₂O₅ core–shell heterostructures were synthesized by growing V₂O₃ and V₂O₅ crystallites on ZnO nanostructures, respectively. The substantial difference between the crystal morphology and the crystalline quality of sputtering-deposited V₂O₃ and V₂O₅ crystallites led to different NO₂ gas sensing responses of the sensors composed of ZnO–V₂O₃ and ZnO–V₂O₅ heterostructures. Compared with the sensor composed of the ZnO–V₂O₅ heterostructures, an extremely high NO₂ gas sensing response was observed for the sensor composed of the ZnO–V₂O₃ heterostructures because of their granular crystallite features and more defective crystal quality.