New Hydrogen Gas Sensing Method Uses Commercially Available Membrane Filters

Scientists at Northern Illinois University recently published a new approach for fabricating hydrogen gas sensors by depositing palladium onto commercially available filtration membranes.  This creates networks of ultrasmall palladium nanowires without the traditional obstacles of nanofabrication (tedious production, potential contamination).  Palladium, besides poisoning Iron Man, is highly selective to Hydrogen gas and therefore commonly used in room-temperature solid-state Hydrogen sensors.

The new method involves a network of ultrasmall palladium nanowires (<10nm) being placed on 60 micron thick membranes with a nominal filtration pore diameter of 20nm. The end result is that this new type of fabrication method outperformed traditional hydrogen sensors, such as continuous reference film, by providing higher sensitivity and shorter response times. Better hydrogen sensing can lead to greater efficiency in areas such as steel manufacturing and clean energy research.