Purpose – This paper aims to present the methods of improving selectivity and sensitivity of resistance gas sensors. Design/methodology/approach – This paper compares various methods of improving gas sensing by temperature modulation, UV irradiation or fluctuation-enhanced sensing. The authors analyze low-frequency resistance fluctuations in commercial Taguchi gas sensors and the recently developed tungsten trioxide (WO3) gas-sensing...

Resistive gas sensors are very popular and reliable but suffer from low selectivity and sensitivity. Various methods have been suggested to improve both features without increasing the number of sensors in gas detection systems. Fluctuation enhanced gas sensing was proposed to improve gas detection efficiency by analyzing low-frequency resistance fluctuations, and noise parameters can be more informative than the single DC resistance...

The sensitivity and selectivity of WO3-based gas sensors can be enhanced by UV-irradiation-induced modulation, especially if different wavelengths are employed. We used fluctuation-enhanced gas sensing, based on measurements of resistance fluctuations in the gas sensor, to study the effects of such modulation on the noise intensity for ambient atmospheres of synthetic air without and with additions of small amounts of ethanol,...