Spray deposited pristine and Mo doped WO3 thin films for acetaldehyde gas sensing at room temperature

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In this paper, pure WO3 and molybdenum-incorporated WO3 were directly deposited in the form of thin films on the glass substrate. The films were deposited through the spray pyrolysis technique, and their gas sensing properties, structural, optical, electrical, and morphological properties were altered by adding a dopant to the pristine WO3. A direct, one-step approach is used to deposit metal oxide semiconductor materials as thin films, which enhances the ability to detect gas. A novel gas sensing response for acetaldehyde gas detection was observed from Molybdenum doped WO3 thin film at 25 °C. On investigating the sensing performance of both films for various volatile organic compounds (VOC), a high response (54.55 %) towards acetaldehyde was achieved for 2 % molybdenum-doped WO3 film. The XRD analysis demonstrated that the synthesized films are crystalline with triclinic phase. Decrease in crystallite size increases the grain boundaries that enhance the sensing response. The absorption spectra of UV–Visible spectroscopy showed an apparent change of increase in the absorbance and decrease in the optical band gap on addition of the dopant to the pure WO3 thin film. Filamentous structured porous thin films are discovered to have larger voids and greater surface roughness from FE-SEM and AFM, which aids in the adsorption of gas molecules. Mo-doped WO3 thin films showed a strong sensing response due to larger grain boundary scattering and wide pores abetting for more gas adsorption.