• Journal of Sensor Science and Technology
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• v.25 no.2
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• pp.103-109
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• 2016

Recent light-enhanced metal oxide gas sensors are reviewed in this article. The basic mechanisms of a light-enhanced metal oxide gas sensor are discussed. Many literatures reveal that the standalone sensitivity and the response/recovery time enhancements enabled by the exposing light are not as high as the performance enhancement provided by external heating. Therefore, both optimal amount of external heating and exposed light intensity are necessary to increase the performance of these light-enhanced gas sensors. The development of highly light sensitive materials and structures is important to lower the overall power consumptions of the sensors.

• Proceedings of the Korean Vacuum Society Conference
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• 2011.02a
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• pp.65-65
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• 2011

We report the application of conducting metal oxide electrodes for semiconducting metal oxide gas sensors. Pt interdigitated electrodes have been commonly used for metal oxide gas sensor because of the low resistivity, excellent thermal and chemical stability of Pt. However, the high cost of Pt is an obstacle for the wide use of metal oxide gas sensors compared with its counterpart electrochemical gas sensors. Meanwhile, relatively low-cost conducting metal oxides are widely being used for light-emitting diodes, flat panel displays, solar cell and etc. In this work, we have fabricated $WO_3$ and $SnO_2$ thin film gas sensors using interdigitated electrodes of conducting metal oxides. Thin film gas sensors based on conducting metal oxides exhibited superior gas sensing properties than those using Pt interdigitated electrodes. The result was attributed to the low contact resistance between the conducting metal oxide and the sensing material. Consequently, we demonstrated the feasibility of conducting metal oxide interdigitated electrodes for novel gas sensors.

• Journal of Sensor Science and Technology
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• v.27 no.1
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• pp.13-20
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• 2018

Gas sensors based on metal oxide semiconductors are used in numerous applications including monitoring indoor air quality and detecting harmful substances like volatile organic compounds. Nanostructures, for example, nanoparticles, nanotubes, nanodomes, and nanofibers have been widely utilized to improve gas sensing properties of metal oxide semiconductors, and this increases the effective surface area, resulting in participation of more target gas molecules in the surface reaction. In the recent times, 1-dimensional (1D) metal oxide nanostructures fabricated using anodic oxidation have attracted great attention due to their high surface-to-volume ratio with large-area uniformity, reproducibility, and capability of synthesis under ambient air and pressure, leading to cost-effectiveness. Here, we provide a brief overview of 1D metal oxide nanostructures fabricated by anodic oxidation and their gas sensing properties. In addition, recent progress on thin film-based anodic oxidation for application in gas sensors is introduced.

• Journal of Sensor Science and Technology
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• v.31 no.5
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• pp.337-342
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• 2022

Hydrogen (H₂) gas is widely preferred for use as a renewable energy source owing to its characteristics such as environmental friendliness and a high energy density. However, H₂ can easily reverse or explode due to minor external factors. Therefore, H₂ gas monitoring is crucial, especially when the H₂ concentration is close to the lower explosive limit. In this study, metal oxide materials and their p-n heterojunctions were synthesized by a hydrothermal-assisted dip-coating method. The synthesized thin films were used as sensing materials for H₂ gas. When the H₂ concentration was varied, all metal oxide materials exhibited different gas sensitivities. The performance of the metal oxide gas sensor was analyzed to identify parameters that could improve the performance, such as the choice of the metal oxide material, effect of the p-n heterojunctions, and operating temperature conditions of the gas sensor. The experimental results demonstrated that a CuO/ZnO gas sensor with a p-n heterojunction exhibited a high sensitivity and fast response time (134.9% and 8 s, respectively) to 5% H₂ gas at an operating temperature of 300℃.

• Journal of Sensor Science and Technology
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• v.30 no.2
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• pp.114-118
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• 2021

In this study, the sensitivity of an active pixel sensor (APS) was adjusted by employing a gate/body-tied (GBT) p-channel metal-oxide semiconductor field-effect transistor (PMOSFET)-type photodetector with a transfer gate. A GBT PMOSFET-type photodetector can amplify the photocurrent generated by light. Consequently, APSs that incorporate GBT PMOSFET-type photodetectors are more sensitive than those APSs that are based on p-n junctions. In this study, a transfer gate was added to the conventional GBT PMOSFET-type photodetector. Such a photodetector can adjust the sensitivity of the APS by controlling the amount of charge transmitted from the drain to the floating diffusion node according to the voltage of the transfer gate. The results obtained from conducted simulations and measurements corroborate that, the sensitivity of an APS, which incorporates a GBT PMOSFET-type photodetector with a built-in transfer gate, can be adjusted according to the voltage of the transfer gate. Furthermore, the chip was fabricated by employing the standard 0.35 ㎛ complementary metal-oxide semiconductor (CMOS) technology, and the variable sensitivity of the APS was thereby experimentally verified.

• Journal of Sensor Science and Technology
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• v.28 no.6
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• pp.377-384
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• 2019

People currently spend more than 80% of their time indoors; therefore, the management of indoor air quality has become an important issue. The contamination of indoor air can cause sick house syndrome and various environmental diseases such as atopy and nephropathy. Formaldehyde gas, which is the main contaminant of indoor air, is lethal even with microscopic exposure; however, it is commonly used as an adhesive and waterproofing agent for indoor building materials. Therefore, there is a need for a gas sensor capable of detecting trace amounts of formaldehyde gas. In this review, we summarize recent studies on metal oxide-based semiconductor gas sensors for formaldehyde gas detection, methods to improve the gas-sensing properties of metal oxides of various dimensions, and the effects of catalysts for the detection of parts-per-billion level gases. Through this, we discuss the necessary characteristics of the metal oxidebased semiconductors for gas sensors for the development of next-generation sensors.

• Journal of Sensor Science and Technology
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• v.27 no.3
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• pp.160-164
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• 2018

In this paper, a wide dynamic range complementary metal-oxide-semiconductor (CMOS) image sensor with the adjustable sensitivity by using cascode metal-oxide-semiconductor field-effect transistor (MOSFET) and inverter is proposed. The characteristics of the CMOS image sensor were analyzed through experimental results. The proposed active pixel sensor consists of eight transistors operated under various light intensity conditions. The cascode MOSFET is operated as the constant current source. The current generated from the cascode MOSFET varies with the light intensity. The proposed CMOS image sensor has wide dynamic range under the high illumination owing to logarithmic response to the light intensity. In the proposed active pixel sensor, a CMOS inverter is added. The role of the CMOS inverter is to determine either the conventional mode or the wide dynamic range mode. The cascode MOSFET let the current flow the current if the CMOS inverter is turned on. The number of pixels is $140(H){\times}180(V)$ and the CMOS image sensor architecture is composed of a pixel array, multiplexer (MUX), shift registers, and biasing circuits. The sensor was fabricated using $0.35{\mu}m$ 2-poly 4-metal CMOS standard process.

• Korean Journal of Food Science and Technology
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• v.34 no.6
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• pp.947-953
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• 2002

Two types of electronic nose were used for investigating the quality of dried lavers stored at 5, 15, and $30^{\circ}C$ RH of 32, 43, and 75%. The electronic nose is composed of metal oxide sensors, and GC is based on SAW sensor. Quality change in dried lavers was described in terms of the sensitivities $(R_{gas}/R_{air})$ of the sensors. Principal component analysis (PCA) was carried out using data obtained from six metal oxide sensors. The first principal component scores were correlated with quality changes of dried lavers. As storage time increased, the stored laver cluster separated from that of fresh lavers. A chromatogram was obtained from GC based on SAW sensor. Olfactory image, A $VaporPrint^{TM}$ image for pattern recognition, showed a significant difference between the stored and the fresh samples. Dried lavers during storage at $30^{\circ}C$ and 75% had bacterial counts of $5.7{\times}10^6\;CFU/g$ after 8 day. Increase of microbial count correlated with the response of electronic nose $(r^2=0.87)$. Whereas, color values showed no correlation.

• Journal of Sensor Science and Technology
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• v.26 no.4
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• pp.228-234
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• 2017

Gas sensors based on metal-oxide-semiconductors are predominantly used in numerous applications including monitoring indoor air quality and detecting harmful substances such as volatile organic compounds. Nanostructures, e.g., nanoparticles, nanotubes, nanodomes, or nanofibers, have been widely utilized to improve the gas sensing properties of metal-oxide-semiconductors by increasing the effective surface area participating in the surface reaction with target gas molecules. Recently, 1-dimensional (1D) metal oxide nanostructures fabricated using glancing angle deposition (GAD) method with e-beam evaporation have been widely employed to increase the surface-to-volume ratio significantly with large-area uniformity and reproducibility, leading to promising gas sensing properties. Herein, we provide a brief overview of 1D metal oxide nanostructures fabricated using GAD and their gas sensing properties in terms of fabrication methods, morphologies, and additives. Moreover, the gas sensing mechanisms and perspectives are presented.

• Journal of Sensor Science and Technology
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• v.30 no.2
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• pp.82-87
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• 2021

In this paper, we propose a high-speed, low-power complementary metal-oxide semiconductor (CMOS) binary image sensor featuring a gate/body-tied (GBT) p-channel metal-oxide-semiconductor field-effect transistor (PMOSFET)-type photodetector based on a double-tail comparator. The GBT photodetector forms a structure in which the floating gate (n+ polysilicon) and body of the PMOSFET are tied, and amplifies the photocurrent generated by incident light. The double-tail comparator compares the output signal of a pixel against a reference voltage and returns a binary signal, and it exhibits improved power consumption and processing speed compared with those of a conventional two-stage comparator. The proposed sensor has the advantages of a high signal processing speed and low power consumption. The proposed CMOS binary image sensor was designed and fabricated using a standard 0.18 ㎛ CMOS process.