Enhanced chemosensing of ammonia based on the novel molecular semiconductor-doped insulator (MSDI) heterojunctions

A series of new molecular semiconductor-doped insulator (MSDI) heterojunctions as conductimetric transducers to NH3 sensing were fabricated based on a novel semiconducting molecular material, an amphiphilic tris(phthalocyaninato) rare earth triple-decker complex, Eu2[Pc(15C5)4]2[Pc(OC10H21)8], quasi-Langmuir–Shafer (QLS) film, as a top-layer, and vacuum-deposited and cast film of CuPc as well as copper tetra-tert-butyl phthalocyanine (CuTTBPc) QLS film as a sub-layer, named as MSDIs 1, 2 and 3, respectively. MSDIs 1–3 and respective sub-layers prepared from three different methods were characterized by X-ray diffraction, electronic absorption spectra and current–voltage (I–V) measurements. Depending on the sub-layer film-forming method used, α-phase CuPc film structure, β-phase CuPc crystallites and H-type aggregates of CuTTBPc have been obtained, respectively. An increasing sensitivity to NH3 at varied concentrations in the range of 15–800 ppm, follows the order MSDI 2