Development of La-impregnated TiO2 based ethanol sensors for next generation automobile application.

Bio-fuel, a blend of ethanol (~ 10 to 85%) and gasoline with various compositions, is one of the promising next generation energy sources in automobile industries, especially in flex-fuel vehicles. Here, the detection of ethanol content is essential for adjusting different fuel combustion parameters. But till date no dedicated sensor is available in the market for this purpose. With this perspective, in the present work, we have developed a selective ethanol sensor based on La³⁺ impregnated TiO₂, which would be capable to detect and differentiate different high concentration of ethanol in gasoline quite precisely. We have used a facile sol–gel procedure to synthesize the pristine and La-impregnated (~ 2 to 6 at.%) titania nanopowders. The phase transformation, structural, and morphological analyses were carried out using thermogravimetric analysis (TGA), X-ray diffraction (XRD), transmission electron microscope (TEM), energy dispersive X-ray (EDX), UV–Visible and photoluminescence (PL) measurements. Taguchi type sensors were fabricated from the as-prepared powders and their ethanol sensing performances were studied. ~ 4 at.% of La concentration was found to be most efficient to stabilize the sensing favorable anatase phase of TiO₂, as well as gave the best sensing response, ~ 82% in 10% ethanol at operating temperature of ~ 350 °C. This sensing response increased to 96% for pure ethanol. The selectivity of the sensor toward the ethanol with respect to other gases in bio-fuel was quite high. A model bio-fuel composition (E10) was also prepared and performance was evaluated. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]