https://doi.org/10.1140/epjb/e2011-20225-8
An ab initio study on gas sensing properties of graphene and Si-doped graphene
1
Department of Physics, Qufu Normal University, Qufu, Shandong, 273165, P.R. China
2
Department of Physics, Taishan University, Taian, Shandong, 271021, P.R. China
3
School of Chemical Engineering, University of Queensland, 4072 Brisbane, Australia
4
School of Physics, Shandong University, Jinan, Shandong, 250100, P.R. China
5
Institute of Crystal Materials, Shandong University, Jinan, Shandong, 250100, P.R. China
Corresponding authors: a fenglitsu@163.com - b z.zhu@uq.edu.au
Received:
13
January
2011
Revised:
8
April
2011
Published online:
22
June
2011
In order to exploit the potential applications of graphene as gas sensors, the adsorptions of a series of small gas molecules (such as CO, O2, NO2 and H2O) on pristine graphene (PG) and Si-doped graphene (SiG) have been investigated by ab initio calculations. Our results indicate that the electronic properties of PG are sensitive to O2 and NO2 molecules, but not changed much by the adsorption of CO and H2O molecules. Compared with PG, SiG is much more reactive in the adsorption of CO, O2, NO2 and H2O. The strong interactions between SiG and the adsorbed molecules induce dramatic changes to the electronic properties of SiG. Therefore, we suggest that SiG could be a good gas sensor for CO, O2, NO2 and H2O.
© EDP Sciences, Società Italiana di Fisica, Springer-Verlag, 2011