Low-Temperature Hydrogen Sensor: Enhanced Performance Enabled through Photoactive Pd-Decorated TiO2 Colloidal Crystals

R&D Focus Areas:
Safety and standards, Specialised components and devices

Lead Organisation:
RMIT University

Partners:
Not applicable

Status:
Active

Start date:
2020

Completion date
Ongoing

Key contacts:
Dr. Samuel Ippolito – samuel.ippolito@rmit.edu.au
Dr. Ylias Sabri – ylias.sabri@rmit.edu.au
Professor Suresh Bhargava – suresh.bhargava@rmit.edu.au

Funding:
RMIT University Enabling Capability Platform (ECP)

Project total cost:
AUD$570,000

Project summary description:
This project was initiated following an Australian Research Council (ARC) funded project DP150101939 “Early-Stage Medical Diagnostics by Plasmon-Mediated Gas Sensing” led by the Australian National University and of which RMIT University was a partner (with Associate Professor Samuel Ippolito as the RMIT Chief Investigator).

The high demand for hydrogen gas sensors is arising as the fuel is highly flammable. Hydrogen gas will need to be monitored at trace levels not only in fuel cells for safety leak detection applications but also in industrial process control and emissions monitoring.

There are major challenges to overcome in order to achieve high sensitivity and hence low limit of detection (LoD) toward hydrogen. The intention of this project is to demonstrate that light-assisted amperometric gas sensors, employing sensitive layers based on Pd-decorated TiO₂ long-range ordered crystals, can achieve excellent H₂ sensing performance.

This unique combination of materials and novel layered structure can enable the detection of hydrogen gas down to 50 ppm with highly promising LoD capabilities, down to 3.5 ppm at an operating temperature of 33 °C. The high performance of the sensor makes it attractive for applications that require low-level (ppm as opposed to conventional % levels) hydrogen gas detection. Most importantly, the developed sensor exhibits high selectivity (>93%) toward hydrogen over other gas species such as CO₂, C₄H₈O, C₃H₆O, CH₃CHO, and NO, which are commonly found to coexist in the environment.

Related publications and key links:
Low-Temperature Hydrogen Sensor: Enhanced Performance Enabled through Photoactive Pd-Decorated TiO2 Colloidal Crystals | ACS Sensors

https://www.rmit.edu.au/news/all-news/2020/dec/hydrogen-sensor

https://patents.justia.com/patent/20230408475

Higher degree studies supported:
Three PhD students (one graduated, two in progress) are supported by this project.

 

Reviewed: August 2024