LAUSR

In present work, we report a room-temperature ozone sensor using InGaZnO (IGZO) decorated amorphous Ga2O3 (a-Ga2O3) thin films. The gas sensing tests demonstrate that the topmost IGZO modification can significantly promote the sensors' responsivity. Intriguingly, the sensing capability presents a firstly increasing and then decreasing tendency as the surface morphology of IGZO develops from dispersed particles to a continuous film. Finite difference time domain (FDTD) simulation results prove that IGZO nanoparticles can remarkably increase the surface density of photo-generated electrons, which clearly manifests a strong dependence on IGZO particle size and contributes to the boosted responsiveness. However, once IGZO particles coalesce into a thin film, the ozone sensor's responsivity starts to decrease even though the number of photo-generated carriers still increases. The smaller specific surface area of IGZO thin film is believed responsible for this phenomenon. The proposed ozone gas sensors own the merits of low cost, room-temperature detection, easy integration and mass production, which significantly expands the application fields of a-Ga2O3 thin film.