Customizable Colorimetric Sensor Array via a High-Throughput Robot for Mitigation of Humidity Interference in Gas...

Area of Science:

• Chemical Sensors
• Materials Science
• Robotics

Background:

• Gas sensors face significant challenges from humidity interference, leading to unpredictable signal fluctuations and increased quantitative detection errors.
• Traditional methods often suppress humidity response, limiting accuracy across diverse application scenarios.

Purpose of the Study:

• To introduce and validate a novel concept of selecting humidity sensors from a pool to compensate for humidity signals in gas sensors.
• To demonstrate the mitigation of humidity interference in colorimetric gas quantification using a customized sensor array.

Main Methods:

• Utilized an algorithm-driven high-throughput experimental robot to discover optimal colorimetric humidity sensing formulations across a ten-dimensional variable space.
• Constructed a parent colorimetric humidity sensor array (91 formulations) as a sensor pool for humidity signal compensation.
• Employed a combination optimization strategy to identify quasi-optimal sensor subarrays for customized humidity compensation.

Main Results:

• Achieved accurate gas quantification with significant reduction in mean absolute percentage error (MAPE) from 4.4% to 0.75% and 5.48% to 1.37%.
• Demonstrated the sensor array's excellent humidity selectivity against 10 different gases.
• Validated the feasibility and superiority of robot-assisted construction of customizable sensor arrays for interference mitigation.

Conclusions:

• The proposed sensor pool strategy effectively compensates for humidity interference, enabling more accurate gas quantification.
• Robot-assisted construction of customizable sensor arrays offers a superior approach to traditional methods for mitigating humidity effects.
• This method enhances the reliability and applicability of gas sensors in dynamic humidity environments.