Selective Detection of CO2 and H2O Dual Analytes Through Decoupling Surface Density and Shear Modulus Based on Single SAW Resonator

Abstract

The detection of carbon dioxide (CO <sub xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink">2</sub> ) and water molecules (H <sub xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink">2</sub> O) is of great interest because they play an important role in the fields of industry, agriculture, climate and medical treatment. However, both experimental studies and engineering applications indicate that most CO <sub xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink">2</sub> sensors suffer from selectivity problems in high humidity. Herein, we detect concentrations of CO <sub xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink">2</sub> and H <sub xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink">2</sub> O simultaneously through decoupling surface density and shear modulus under negligible effect of electric conductivity based on a surface acoustic wave (SAW) resonator at 221 MHz. The SAW-based sensor demonstrates a small measurement error of ~ 65 ppm in CO <sub xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink">2</sub> and ~ 1.2% RH in H <sub xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink">2</sub> O. The sensor also shows excellent short-term stability of 0.8 kHz. Besides, this general method that using a single SAW resonator to detect two analytes selectively will be useful for other resonator-based sensors.