Hydrothermal Synthesis of CeO2-SnO2 Nanoflowers for Improving Triethylamine Gas Sensing Property

Developing the triethylamine sensor with excellent sensitivity and selectivity is important for detecting the triethylamine concentration change in the environment. In this work, flower-like CeO2-SnO2composites with different contents of CeO2were successfully synthesized by the one-step hydrothermal reaction. Some characterization methods were used to research the morphology and structure of the samples. Gas-sensing performance of the CeO2-SnO2gas sensor was also studied and the results show that the flower-like CeO2-SnO2composite showed an enhanced gas-sensing property to triethylamine compared to that of pure SnO2. The response value of the 5 wt.% CeO2content composite based sensor to 200 ppm triethylamine under the optimum working temperature (310 °C) is approximately 3.8 times higher than pure SnO2. In addition, CeO2-SnO2composite is also significantly more selective for triethylamine than pure SnO2and has better linearity over a wide range of triethylamine concentrations. The improved gas-sensing mechanism of the composites toward triethylamine was also carefully discussed.Keywords:CeO2-SnO2;nanostructure;hydrothermal;triethylamine;gas sensor