Investigation on Sensing Performance of Highly Doped Sb/SnO 2 .

Tin dioxide (SnO 2 ) is the most-used semiconductor for gas sensing applications. However, lack of selectivity and humidity influence limit its potential usage. Antimony (Sb) doped SnO 2 showed unique electrical and chemical properties, since the introduction of Sb ions leads to the creation of a new shallow band level and of oxygen vacancies acting as donors in SnO 2 . Although low-doped SnO 2 :Sb demonstrated an improvement of the sensing performance compared to pure SnO 2 , there is a lack of investigation on this material. To fill this gap, we focused this work on the study of gas sensing properties of highly doped SnO 2 :Sb. Morphology, crystal structure and elemental composition were characterized, highlighting that Sb doping hinders SnO 2 grain growth and decreases crystallinity slightly, while lattice parameters expand after the introduction of Sb ions into the SnO 2 crystal. XRF and EDS confirmed the high purity of the SnO 2 :Sb powders, and XPS highlighted a higher Sb concentration compared to XRF and EDS results, due to a partial Sb segregation on superficial layers of Sb/SnO 2 . Then, the samples were exposed to different gases, highlighting a high selectivity to NO 2 with a good sensitivity and a limited influence of humidity. Lastly, an interpretation of the sensing mechanism vs. NO 2 was proposed.