Hierarchical WO3•H2O porous microsphere: Hydrothermal synthesis, structure and gas-sensing performance

In this work, hierarchical WO3 center dot H2O porous microspheres and conventional smooth WO3 center dot H2O microspheres were successfully fabricated via a simple hydrothermal process. The products were characterized by X-ray diffraction and scanning electron microscope. Meanwhile, the possible evolution processes of the two products were discussed based on time-dependent experiments. Remarkably, hierarchical porous spherical architectures which possess abundant micro reaction rooms, exhibited improved gas-sensing performance compared to smooth sphere-like structures. It is believed that this unique nanostructure has great potential to enhance the gas-sensing properties of tungsten oxides and other semiconductor materials.