Spinel ferrites gas sensors: a review of sensing parameters, mechanism and the effects of ion substitution

Abstract There is an increasing demand of highly sensitive, stable and highly selective gas sensors to detect toxic gases. This is inspired by the need to monitor the concentration of these gases in order to guarantee humans, animals and environmental safety. Metal ferrites (AFe2O3, where A is a metal) based sensors are paramount in this field of sensing. Among the gases detectable using metal ferrites includes carbon monoxide (CO), liquefied petroleum gas (LPG), hydrogen sulfide (H2S), petrol and methane (CH4). This reviews presents various parameters which plays key role in the design of ferrite gas sensors. They include; operating temperatures, dopants, grain size, particle size, selectivity, surface area, concentration of the gas, sensitivity as well as recovery time. In addition, the various methods which are used to synthesize ferrite gas sensors are briefly explained. Key considerations in the designing of excellent ferrite gas sensors such as calcination temperature, working temperature, dopants, and concentration as well as optimization condition among others are outlined. In addition this paper reviews the various metal ferrites such as nickel ferrites and nickel doped ferrites, cobalt and cobalt doped ferrites, zinc and zinc doped ferrites, magnesium and magnesium doped ferrites among others that have been researched as gas sensors.