Liquefied Petroleum Gas Sensing of Polyaniline–Titanium Dioxide Nanocomposites

Polyaniline/titanium dioxide nanocomposites were prepared using α-dextrose as surfactant and ammonium persulphate as an oxidant. The PANI/TiO₂ nanocomposite is characterized by FTIR, XRD and TEM. The FTIR spectra revel that the presence of characteristic peaks of benzenoid, qunoide rings and metal-oxygen stretching. The XRD studies show the monoclinic structure of the nanocomposites. The TEM study shows that the size of TiO₂ is in the order of 9 nm where as the composite size is of the order of 13 nm and further it was observed that the TiO₂ particles are intercalated to form a core shell of PANI. The maximum sensing response for LPG is found to be 90% for 30 wt.% of PANI/TiO₂ nanocomposites at 400 ppm whereas for Benzene and Toluene it is negligibly small (≤ 20%) and for the cyclohexane sensing response it is around 30% for different wt.%.