Development of cost effective metal oxide semiconductor based gas sensor over flexible chitosan/PVP blended polymeric substrate

In the present work, biodegradable and flexible chitosan/polyvinylpyrrolidone (CHP) polymeric substrate was fabricated by solvent casting method. This is a novel demonstration of the combination of natural polymer (chitosan) and synthetic polymer (PVP) for next-generation semiconductor device applications. The ZnO thin films were successfully synthesized on these polymeric substrates by facile drop-casting method for gas sensing applications. The hydrogen gas sensing properties of ZnO deposited on the polymeric substrate and SiO2 substrate show similar performance. The structural, morphological, optical, thermal, and tensile strength of the CHP substrate were studied using X-ray diffraction (XRD), Scanning electron microscopy (SEM), UV-visible spectroscopy, Derivative thermogravimetric analysis (DTG), and Universal testing machine (UTM), respectively. Our study suggests that the biodegradable CH/PVP flexible polymeric substrate provides a new way for the implementation of an eco-friendly green substrate in numerous electronic device applications.