Design of a novel Ag-ZnO@ZIF-8 soda biscuit-like heterostructure for high-performance ethylene glycol sensing

Soda biscuit-like Ag-ZnO@ZIF-8 heterostructures were successfully synthesized using a secondary hydrothermal method for the first time, demonstrating exceptional ethylene glycol sensing performance. The sample (2-Methylimidazol (MeIm) concentration of 0.04 g) exhibits a remarkable response value of 1325.50 to 100 ppm ethylene glycol at 240 °C, along with a rapid response time of merely 7 s. Additionally, it displays outstanding gas selectivity (k = 28.63-696.90), great reproducibility and long-term stability. Further experiments indicate that the enhancement of the composite material's gas sensing performance can be primarily attributed to the interfacial electron transfer effect, the abundance of oxygen vacancies, and the synergistic interactions within the heterostructures. Overall, this study lays a solid theoretical foundation for the practical detection applications of ethylene glycol and provides new insights into the research on gas sensors based on ZnO-organic frameworks.