There is a special reason for reviewing this book at this time: it is the 50th edition of a compendium that is known and used frequently in most chemical and physical laboratories in many parts of the world. Surely, a publication that has been published for 56 years, withstanding the vagaries of science in this century, must have had something to offer. There is another reason: while the book is a standard fixture in most chemical and physical laboratories, including those in medical centers, it is not as frequently seen in the laboratories of physician's offices (those either in solo or group practice). I believe that the Handbook can be useful in those laboratories. One of the reasons, among others, is that the various basic items of information it offers may be helpful in new tests, either physical or chemical, which are continuously being published. The basic information may relate

Handbook of Chemistry and Physics

Elements Of X Ray Diffraction

Sensor technology has an important effect on many aspects in our society, and has gained much progress, propelled by the development of nanoscience and nanotechnology. Current research efforts are directed toward developing high-performance gas sensors with low operating temperature at low fabrication costs. A gas sensor working at room temperature is very appealing as it provides very low power consumption and does not require a heater for high-temperature operation, and hence simplifies the fabrication of sensor devices and reduces the operating cost. Nanostructured materials are at the core of the development of any room-temperature sensing platform. The most important advances with regard to fundamental research, sensing mechanisms, and application of nanostructured materials for room-temperature conductometric sensor devices are reviewed here. Particular emphasis is given to the relation between the nanostructure and sensor properties in an attempt to address structure-property correlations. Finally, some future research perspectives and new challenges that the field of room-temperature sensors will have to address are also discussed.

Nanostructured Materials for Room-Temperature Gas Sensors

An insight into the analogies, state-of-the-art technologies, concepts, and prospects under the umbrella of perovskite materials (both inorganic-organic hybrid halide perovskites and ferroelectric perovskites) for future multifunctional energy conversion and storage devices is provided. Often, these are considered entirely different branches of research; however, considering them simultaneously and holistically can provide several new opportunities. Recent advancements have highlighted the potential of hybrid perovskites for high-efficiency solar cells. The intrinsic polar properties of these materials, including the potential for ferroelectricity, provide additional possibilities for simultaneously exploiting several energy conversion mechanisms such as the piezoelectric, pyroelectric, and thermoelectric effect and electrical energy storage. The presence of these phenomena can support the performance of perovskite solar cells. The energy conversion using these effects (piezo-, pyro-, and thermoelectric effect) can also be enhanced by a change in the light intensity. Thus, there lies a range of possibilities for tuning the structural, electronic, optical, and magnetic properties of perovskites to simultaneously harvest energy using more than one mechanism to realize an improved efficiency. This requires a basic understanding of concepts, mechanisms, corresponding material properties, and the underlying physics involved with these effects.

Mutual Insight on Ferroelectrics and Hybrid Halide Perovskites: A Platform for Future Multifunctional Energy Conversion.

https://hal.archives-ouvertes.fr/hal-00120432/document

Raman Spectroscopy of Nanomaterials: How Spectra Relate to Disorder, Particle Size and Mechanical Properties

NiO nanoparticle-based urea biosensor.

Optical gas sensors provide an alternative over the conventional conductometric gas sensors Carbon monoxide (CO) gas is generally regarded as one of the most dangerous air pollutants, hence, a room temperature operated CO gas sensor using ZnO sensing film deposited on Au coated prisms has been developed using an indigenously developed surface plasmon resonance (SPR) measurement setup This system is found to be highly sensitive with very fast response towards a wide concentration range (05–100 ppm) of CO gas at room temperature and hence pave way for commercial application of an efficient optical CO gas sensor

Carbon monoxide (CO) optical gas sensor based on ZnO thin films

Semiconducting SnO2 thin films having higher value of electrical conductivity have been deposited using RF sputtering technique in the reactive gas environment (30% O2 + 70% Ar) using a metallic tin (Sn) target for detection of oxidizing NO2 gas. The effect of growth pressure (12–18 mTorr) on the surface morphology and structural property of SnO2 film was studied using Atomic force microscopy (AFM), Scanning electron microscopy (SEM) and X-ray Diffraction (XRD) respectively. Film deposited at 16 mTorr sputtering pressure was porous with rough microstructure and exhibits high sensor response (∼2.9 × 104) towards 50 ppm NO2 gas at a comparatively low operating temperature (∼100 °C). The sensor response was found to increase linearly from 1.31 × 102 to 2.9 × 104 while the response time decrease from 12.4 to 1.6 min with increase in the concentration of NO2 gas from 1 to 50 ppm. The reaction kinetics of target NO2 gas on the surface of SnO2 thin film at the Sn sites play important role in enhancing the response characteristics at lower operating temperature (∼100 °C). The results obtained in the present study are encouraging for realization of SnO2 thin film based sensor for efficient detection of NO2 gas with low power consumption.

SnO2 thin film sensor with enhanced response for NO2 gas at lower temperatures

Flower-like ZnO nanostructure based electrochemical DNA biosensor for bacterial meningitis detection

Sulfur dioxide (SO 2 ) is one of the most toxic and hazardous gas having adverse effect on the health and environment. In the present report, an attempt is made to fabricate SO 2 gas sensor using SnO 2 thin film integrated with various metal oxide catalyst (PdO, CuO, NiO, MgO, V 2 O 5 ) in the form of 10 nm thin dotted clusters of 600 μm diameter. The structural, optical and surface morphological properties of the SnO 2 thin film have been studied. The bare SnO 2 thin film sensor exhibits the sensing response of about 1.3 at 220 °C whereas, NiO/SnO 2 sensor shows the enhanced sensing response (∼56) towards 500 ppm SO 2 gas at a relatively low operating temperature (180 °C). A correlation has been established between the observed sensing response and the properties of the sensing film. Selectivity of the NiO/SnO 2 sensor was tested towards different interfering gases and found to be highly selective for SO 2 gas.

Monika Tomar

Papers

NiO nanoparticle-based urea biosensor.

Carbon monoxide (CO) optical gas sensor based on ZnO thin films

SnO2 thin film sensor with enhanced response for NO2 gas at lower temperatures

Flower-like ZnO nanostructure based electrochemical DNA biosensor for bacterial meningitis detection

Metal oxide catalyst assisted SnO2 thin film based SO2 gas sensor