Introduction

Gas sensors, which allow ubiquitous and personal air-quality monitoring, pollution tracking, and preventive health care via point-of-care breath analysis, are in great demand and will become one of indispensable internet of things sensors toward the hyper-connected1,2,3,4,5. To achieve this agenda, development of low-power and monolithically integrated gas sensors without sacrificing their sensitivity is crucial, and thus various gas-sensing methods have been proposed based on electrochemical, resistive, and nanomechanical system6,7,8,9,10,11,12. In particular, chemiresistors made of semiconducting metal oxides have been extensively explored and are now the most common gas-sensing devices. These gas sensors operate in resistance modulation resulting from gas-oxide charge transfer at an elevated temperature, but they are typically bulky and require high-power consumption. In recent years, field-effect transistors (FETs) have emerged and shown a potential for overcoming the aforementioned drawbacks13,14,15.

The FET-based gas sensor works on a principle of carrier transport modulation on the channel induced by gas molecules. Various nanomaterials, such as silicon nanowires, carbon nanotubes, and organic semiconductors, have been used as channel materials of the FET-based gas sensors to realize high sensitivity16,17,18,19,20,21,22,23,24. Especially, two-dimensional (2D) nanomaterials including transition metal dichalcogenides have attracted a significant attention as a promising candidate for ultrasensitive gas sensors because of a high surface-to-volume ratio and excellent charge sensitivity25,26,27,28,29.

In particular, ultrahigh sensitive gas sensors based on molybdenum disulfide (MoS2) have been successfully fabricated with mechanical and chemical exfoliation methods30,31,32. However, poor reproducibility and uniformity of exfoliated MoS2 flakes significantly limit their practical applications. In this regard, massive efforts to grow large-area and high-crystalline MoS2 films have been devoted, and a feasibility of diverse growth methods has been demonstrated, including chemical vapor deposition (CVD)33,34, atomic layer deposition (ALD)35,36, and physical vapor deposition (PVD)37,38. Nonetheless, the poor reliability and reproducibility of CVD owing to the unstable gas flow dynamic in the chamber as well as high-cost and low throughput of ALD reduce the availability of rather efficient and scalable growth techniques. Thus, a sputtering for large-area uniform MoS2 films has been developed, because sputtering is a widely commercialized technique in the industry to facilitate mass-production of thin films. The sputtered MoS2 shows large-area uniformity and good electrical properties39,40. However, no reports have been conducted on MoS2 gas sensor arrays driven by large-area active-matrix.

Here, we demonstrate a scalable, highly sensitive, and monolithically integrable gas sensor active-matrix array based on bilayer MoS2 films synthesized via a two-step method, that is, through subsequent radio-frequency (RF) magnetron sputtering and thermal sulfurization. The fabricated MoS2 thin-film transistor (TFT)-based gas sensor exhibits a reduction of field-effect mobility (μFE) and a positive threshold voltage (VTH) shift upon the exposure to nitrogen dioxide (NO2) at room temperature, which are dissimilar to the change of exfoliated MoS2-based gas sensors. We found that two-step-grown MoS2 film has a polycrystalline structure and its abundant grain boundaries activate the adsorption of NO2 molecules, resulting in the increment of potential barriers to inhibit the carrier transport in the channel. Monolithic integration of the active-matrix gas sensor array comprising switching and sensing TFTs is presented with transient gas-sensing characteristics.

Results and discussion

Characterizations of two-step-grown MoS2

The schematic image of Fig. 1a shows the synthesis of MoS2 film on a silicon (Si)/silicon dioxide (SiO2) substrate, where molybdenum (Mo) metal  was pre-deposited by RF magnetron sputtering at room temperature with RF power of 150 W, and then sulfurized at 750 °C in a CVD chamber with a gas mixture of hydrogen sulfide (H2S), hydrogen (H2), and argon (Ar). The sulfurization induced a transition from the Mo film into a layered MoS2 structure (bottom of Fig. 1a). The thickness of Mo film, which determines the thickness of the final MoS2 film, is controlled by the sputtering parameters and the deposition time41. However, in case of thick Mo film (>5 nm), it could not be completely sulfurized due to the limited diffusion length of sulfur (S) atoms, resulting in multiphase film with MoS2 on top and Mo underneath41,42. To obtain fully sulfurized MoS2 films, we deposited ultra-thin Mo film with the thickness of 2 nm by optimizing the deposition time to 180 s. In the optical image of Fig. 1b, the fabricated MoS2 film showed a blue color, which is completely different from the purple color of Si/SiO2 substrate, with a highly uniform distribution over a centimeter scale, denoting its continuity and connectivity of the large-area MoS2 film. The thickness of the MoS2 film was measured as 1.64 nm using atomic force microscopy (AFM), which may suggest two MoS2 layers (insets of Fig. 1b). Raman spectrum of the MoS2 film (Fig. 1c) showed two typical peaks of in-plane (E12g) and out-of-plane (A1g) modes at 383.52 cm−1 and 405.69 cm−1, respectively. The peak difference (∆k) between the E12g and A1g modes was calculated to be 22.17 cm−1, corresponding to bilayer MoS243, consistently with the AFM result. The average values of the E12g and A1g peaks from randomly distributed nine points on the 2 × 2 cm2 MoS2 film were estimated to 383.32 and 405.49 cm−1, respectively, with ∆k of 22.17 cm−1 (Inset of Fig. 1c), indicating high homogeneity of bilayer MoS2 on large-area.

Fig. 1: MoS2 synthesized by two-step method.
figure 1

a Schematic image of two-step growth of bilayer MoS2. b Optical image  of MoS2 film and Si/SiO2 substrate, and thickness profile of MoS2 film. c Raman and d XPS spectra of MoS2 films.

X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS) was employed to identify chemical binding states of Mo and S atoms in the MoS2 film. XPS spectra of Mo 3d and S 2p core levels of the MoS2 film including deconvolution curves were depicted in Fig. 1d. In Mo 3d spectrum, two strong doublet peaks were observed at 229.75 (Mo4+ 3d5/2) and 232.88 eV (Mo4+ 3d3/2), respectively, corresponding to MoS2 bonding44. In addition, two small doublets peaks of Mo6+ 3d5/2 and Mo6+ 3d3/2 were confirmed at 232.93 and 236.06 eV, respectively, which were attributed to the existence of residual MoO344. However, the atomic fractions of the Mo6+, which was estimated to be 13% (<20% of the total Mo species), is reasonable for air-exposed MoS2 films45. In the S 2p spectrum, only two doublet peaks belonging to MoS2 bonding appeared at 162.44 (S2− 2p3/2) and 163.62 eV (S2− 2p1/2), respectively. The quantitative ratio between S2− 2p and Mo4+ 3d was ~1.96, which indicates a perfect MoS2 configuration.

Transmission electron microscopy observations of MoS2 film

The atomic structure of the MoS2 film was explored through transmission electron microscopy (TEM). The cross-sectional TEM image of the MoS2 film shows its 2D bilayer structure as shown in Fig. 2a. A plan-view TEM image of the MoS2 over an area of 41 × 41 nm2 exhibits its large-area continuous lattice (Fig. 2b). In addition, several kinds of Moirè patterns were observed, indicating a lattice mismatch between two layers. A layered structure is formed by the van der Waals (vdW) interactions between the different layers. The relatively weak vdW forces can induce variations in strain response between adjacent layers, resulting in the lattice mismatch by sliding the layer or nucleating ripples46. The MoS2 films with Moirè fringes exhibit a ring-shape of fast Fourier transform (FFT) pattern (Inset of Fig. 2b), suggesting a polycrystalline structure of the films. The high-resolution TEM image of Fig. 2c shows partially well-organized hexagonal lattice structures along with grain boundaries. In Fig. 2d, two MoS2 grains of (100) plane meet each other with a relative misorientation of 30°, and the corresponding FFT patterns of the high-resolution TEM image (Inset of Fig. 2d) reveal their diffraction spots indicated with different colors. Despite the insufficient statistical data to identify the size of the MoS2 grain, we can anticipate that many grain boundaries were possessed in the polycrystalline MoS2 films.

Fig. 2: TEM images of MoS2 film.
figure 2

a Cross-sectional and b plan-view TEM images. c Basal plane and d grain boundary (Inset of FFT patterns extracted from each figure).

Electrical properties of MoS2 TFTs

To investigate electrical characteristics of the large-area synthesized MoS2 films, we fabricated MoS2 TFTs as shown in Fig. 3a. The MoS2 films on Si/SiO2 substrate were patterned by photolithography combined with dry etching to obtain active channels for transistors. Titanium (Ti) and gold (Au) electrodes were placed for source and drain contacts. Figure 3b illustrates bottom gate voltage (VGS)–drain current (IDS) curves of the MoS2 TFT in logarithmic (red circle line) and linear (blue square line) scales with VGS range from –40 to 40 V and drain voltage (VDS) of 1 V, where a channel width (W) and length (L) were 20 and 7 μm, respectively. We observed an excellent n-type semiconducting property with a very high on–off ratio (Ion/Ioff) over 2 × 106. VDSIDS curves of the MoS2 TFT obtained in the VGS range from –40 to 40 V at intervals of 10 V (Fig. 3c) also exhibited typical n-type characteristics. Here, the top–down approach of the sputtered MoS2 facilitated a large-volume integrated 2D MoS2 sensor arrays on a substrate. Figure 3d shows statistics on the electrical parameters of maximum transconductance (gm) and VTH obtained by randomly distributed 24 MoS2 TFTs on a substrate (Supplementary Fig. 1), revealing very narrow distributions and small standard deviations of 9% for gm and 17% for VTH, respectively. These statistical distribution of as-fabricated transistors shows superior electrical uniformity.

Fig. 3: Electrical properties of MoS2 TFTs.
figure 3

a Schematic image of MoS2 TFTs. b Transfer characteristics and c output characteristics of MoS2 TFT. d Plot of gm and VTH of 24 different MoS2 TFTs.

NO2 gas-sensing behavior

NO2 gas not only has a huge impact on the environment but can also be a diagnostic tool for breath analysis47. To confirm sensing responses of the MoS2 TFT to NO2 gas, the device was mounted on a stage in a gas chamber equipped with a semiconductor characterization system. An optical image of the MoS2 gas-sensing TFT was shown in Fig. 4a, where W/L of the device was 20/7 μm. Figure 4b shows VGSIDS curves of the MoS2 gas sensor measured under various concentrations of NO2 gas from 0 to 256 ppm. Increasing the NO2 concentration resulted in the significant decrease of IDS over the whole range of VGS, which denotes that the NO2 adsorption on the MoS2 surface reduces the conductivity of the MoS2 channel. We also measured a time-resolved sensing response of the device to confirm its real-time current behavior when NO2 gas was injected into the chamber for 5 min, and then the sensor was recovered via pure N2 purging for 5 min (Fig. 4c). The concentration of NO2 gas was ranged from 8 to 256 ppm, and 1 V of VDS was applied. The response is calculated as (RgasR0)/R0, where Rgas represents a resistance of the device under the NO2 gas environment and R0 is its initial resistance without NO2 gas exposure. VGS was fixed at 0 V since most MoS2 TFTs exhibited higher response values at VGS near 0 V (Supplementary Figs. 2a–d). Considering that the average VTH of the MoS2 TFTs was evaluated as 13.5 V (Fig. 3d), VGS range near 0 V is considered as a subthreshold regime. The high response in subthreshold region has been proposed earlier in many TFT-based sensors48,49,50. In Fig. 4c, as the NO2 concentration increased, Rgas also increased, resulting in positive values of response. However, the response value was not saturated within 5 min owing to a continuous condensation of gas molecules on the MoS2 surface51,52. When we measured the electrical response longer than 5 min (Supplementary Fig. 3), the saturation in sensing response was observed. In addition, rapid recovery was observed when the NO2 gas was removed (Fig. 4c), indicating great suitability of MoS2 TFTs for gas-sensing applications. To confirm a limit of detection of the MoS2 gas sensor, we tried to measure the sensing response of the device at lower ppm level from 1 to 4 ppm. The sensor presented the response value of 0.5% for 1 ppm of NO2 concentration (Supplementary Fig. 4).

Fig. 4: NO2 gas-sensing performances of MoS2 TFTs.
figure 4

a Optical microscopic image of MoS2 TFT. b Transfer characteristics of MoS2 TFT upon NO2 exposure with different concentrations ranging from 0 to 256 ppm. c Real-time sensing response of gas sensor with NO2 exposure from 8 to 256 ppm concentration. d Response of nine different gas sensors measured at NO2 concentrations of 8, 32, and 128 ppm and average response at each concentration.

To evaluate a sensing uniformity of the MoS2 gas sensors, the sensing responses of nine different devices were examined under the injection of various NO2 concentrations. The response of each TFT was presented by different colors depending on different concentrations of NO2; red for 8 ppm, green for 32 ppm and blue for 128 ppm, and the average values of nine TFTs were marked as dotted lines. The response of each device did not deviate significantly from the mean value, which was supported by low standard errors of 1.36, 1.34, and 2.65, respectively.

For in-depth study of the sensing mechanism of the two-step-grown MoS2 gas sensor, we examined variations of device electrical parameters of the device under increasing NO2 gas concentrations. The VTH and μFE values were extracted from each VGSIDS curves in Fig. 4b. In Fig. 5a, the variation of VTH (∆VTH) is plotted as a function of NO2 concentration, indicating continuous positive shift of VTH, especially, with rapid changes in low concentrations. Moreover, μFE  gradually degraded when the NO2 concentrations increased (blue circle in Fig. 5b). These electrical behaviors are unequivocally different from the previously reported exfoliated MoS2 TFT gas sensors29,53. As shown in Supplementary Fig. 5a, for comparison purposes, we also  measured the sensing responses of exfoliated MoS2 TFT having a channel area similar to that of the two-step-grown MoS2 TFT. In the exfoliated MoS2 gas sensors, NO2 gas molecules are physically adsorbed on the basal surface of the MoS2 by vdW interactions32,54,55,56, which generates in-gap states in bandgap region close to the valence band and thus, increases the tunneling of hole carriers29,53. As a result, Ioff for the transistor gradually increased along with NO2 concentrations (Supplementary Fig. 5b). However, these devices showed no change in μFE according to NO2 concentrations, as shown in an orange square in Fig. 5b, unlike the two-step-grown MoS2 TFT. The major difference between two MoS2 FETs is the crystalline structure of MoS2 films, i.e., the two-step-grown MoS2 film is polycrystalline, whereas the exfoliated MoS2 flake is single-crystal. On the polycrystalline MoS2 surface, the abundant grain boundaries are expected to serve as active binding sites for NO2 molecules, so that the adsorption of NO2 on grain boundaries is more dominant than that on basal plane57,58,59, as shown in schematic illumination of an  inset of Fig. 5a. This can be further understood by the fact that the shifts of VTH and μFE variation were gradually diminished as the grain boundaries became saturated.

Fig. 5: Atomic structure-dependent NO2 sensing behavior.
figure 5

aVTH according to NO2 exposure and schematic image of NO2 adsorption on MoS2 grain boundaries (inset). b Comparison of μFE between exfoliated and two-step-grown MoS2 TFTs under different concentrations of NO2. c Calculated activation energy (EA) as a function of VGS and d density of states for MoS2 TFT with and without NO2 gas exposure.

There are many reports on organic TFT-based chemical sensors, having many grain boundaries in their channels, like the two-step-grown MoS259,60,61. In organic TFT sensors, the adsorption of gas analytes on the grain boundaries induces local electric fields through polarization of the semiconductor, leading to the trapping of mobile carriers, and consequently, to variations in current behaviors. To establish the relationship between the NO2 adsorption on the MoS2 grain boundaries and the IDS decrease involving the variations of VTH and μFE, the temperature-dependent current behavior measurements were conducted on two-step-grown MoS2 TFT with and without NO2 gas exposure. We measured VGSIDS curves at different temperatures from 350 to 400 K at intervals of 10 K under pure N2 (Supplementary Fig. 6a) and NO2 environments with the concentration of 256 ppm (Supplementary Fig. 6b). In both cases, two devices exhibited thermally activated IDS when the temperature increased. We extracted a carrier activation energy (EA) from experimentally measured results by using the following equation:

$$I_{DS} = I_{D0}exp\left( { - E_A/k_BT} \right)$$

where ID0 is the prefactor, kB is the Boltzmann constant, and T is temperature62,63,64. Supplementary Figs. 7a and b plot IDS as a function of 1/kBT derived from Supplementary Figs. 6a and b, respectively, and Supplementary Figs. 7c and d are ID0 according to VGS. The calculated EA curves according to VGS are presented in Fig. 5c, which show a higher EA values under NO2 environment than only N2 environment in the whole range of VGS. This indicates that the absorption of NO2 gas molecules induced a higher potential barrier for electron carriers to hop to the next grain. Furthermore, we can estimate the density of sub-gap states as follows:

$$N\left( E \right) = C_{ox}q^{ - 1}\left( {\partial E_A\partial V_{GS}^{ - 1}} \right)^{ - 1}$$

where Cox is oxide capacitance and q is electron charge. Figure 5d shows the calculated density of states near conduction band (Ec). A new sub-state was observed near Ec–0.2 eV under NO2 environment, providing direct evidence of the formation of trap state. These results indicate that the NO2 adsorption on the grain boundaries generates trap states in the forbidden band, inducing charge trapping and increment in the potential barrier, which inhibits the carrier transport in the channel and induces the decrease of IDS and μFE.

Active-matrix of gas sensors based on MoS2 TFT

Large-area and uniform MoS2 films enable to manufacture a monolithically integrated circuit of active-matrix gas sensor array. Figure 6a shows an optical image of the NO2 gas-sensing active-matrix consisting of 7 × 6 pixels; each pixel contains both one switching TFT and one sensing TFT based on large-area synthesized MoS2 film as shown in Fig. 6b. Switching TFTs were operated by local bottom gate separated from back gate and an 80 nm thick aluminum oxide (Al2O3) was used as gate dielectric. To prevent the reaction between NO2 gas molecules and MoS2 of switching transistors, their MoS2 channels were encapsulated by a 20 nm thick SiO2 insulator. Figure 6c shows the transfer curve of a switching MoS2 TFT at a supplied voltage (VDD) of 1 V under switching gate bias (VSW) from –10 to 10 V. The switching states of the MoS2 TFT were determined to be ON when VSW is 10 V and OFF when VSW is –10 V, respectively. Based on the electrical property of the switching TFT, we operated the integrated gas-sensing circuit under different NO2 gas concentrations from 8 to 64 ppm at VDD of 1 V (Fig. 6d). Here, back gate voltage (VBack) was fixed at 0 V so that the sensing TFTs can operate in subthreshold regime. VSW was applied to 10 and –10 V periodically for 5 min. When the device is on the ON state (VSW of 10 V), the channel of switching TFT was opened and the drain current flowed through the channel of sensing TFT. Under NO2 environment, the device current (IDD) gradually decreased in a good agreement with the sensing behavior of the single MoS2 TFT as shown in Fig. 4c. However, the OFF state (VSW of –10 V) limits the current flow in the channel of sensing TFT, resulting in current values independent of NO2 concentrations. As a result, both the great sensing and switching performances of the two-step-grown MoS2 gas sensor active-matrix were confirmed in Fig. 6d. In addition, statistical distributions of the switching and gas-sensing properties of active matrix were presented in the mapping images that present the IDD level of each MoS2 pixel before and after the exposure of NO2 gas when the devices were on the OFF (Supplementary Fig. 8a) and ON (Supplementary Fig. 8b) states, respectively. VDD of 1 V and VBack of 0 V were fixed, respectively. All 42 MoS2 gas sensors exhibited no noticeable variation in IDD values when the devices were OFF state. However, at ON state, the IDD values of all gas sensors were reduced when the NO2 gas was added. However, the differences in the electrical properties were existed for each pixel. Therefore, device calibration is required for practical use.

Fig. 6: MoS2 TFTs-based gas sensor active-matrix.
figure 6

a Image of MoS2 gas sensor active-matrix consisting of 7 × 6 pixels. b Schematic image, circuit diagram, and optical image of integrated single pixel containing a switching TFT and a sensing TFT. c Transfer characteristic of switching TFT. d NO2 gas-sensing behavior of MoS2 gas sensor active device under dynamic switching.

Conclusion

In summary, we have demonstrated active-matrix gas sensor array with pixel circuits comprising gas-sensing TFT and switching TFT based on two-step-grown large-area MoS2 films. Consistent gm as well as Ion/Ioff ratio of ~ 2 × 106 were obtained across a few centimeters of the grown film. The MoS2 TFT-based gas sensors can detect as low as 1 ppm of NO2 level with a wide detection range of up to 256 ppm, and the decent gas-sensing performance are attributed to the abundant grain boundaries of the sputtered polycrystalline MoS2 channel as investigated via structural TEM analysis as well as temperature-dependent current measurements with corresponding sub-gap states analysis. Furthermore, the pixel circuit of the demonstrated 7 × 6 active-matrix gas sensor array is capable of NO2 gas sensing as well as electrical switching depending on operation regimes. The proposed two-step-grown MoS2 TFT-based gas sensors with highly sensitive detection of gas molecules and scalability into integrated systems have enormous potential as a standard gas-sensing platform.

Methods

MoS2 growth

Mo was deposited on P-type boron-doped Si/SiO2 (300 nm) substrates, which were preliminarily cleaned in an ultrasonic bath for 10 min by sequentially using acetone, isopropyl alcohol, and deionized water. Both a Mo target (99.99%) with a 101.6 mm diameter and these substrates were placed in the sputtering chamber under high-vacuum conditions (<3 × 10–6 Torr). The working pressure was maintained at 10 mTorr with an Ar flow of 100 sccm. Prior to the deposition, the Mo target was pre-sputtered for 10 min to remove its oxidized surface and enhance the plasma stability. The Mo deposition was conducted with RF power of 150 W for 180 s at room temperature. The as-deposited Mo films were then placed in a CVD chamber for the sulfurization. The chamber temperature was raised to 750 °C for 30 min. Only Ar gas (50 sccm) was injected until 300 °C. At the higher temperatures, Ar/H2/H2S (50:5:1) gas mixture was added for 15 min. After the sulfurization process, the high temperature of 950 °C was maintained for 1 h to improve the crystallinity of synthesized MoS2 films.

Characterizations

The thickness of MoS2 film was measured with AFM (XE7 Atomic Force Microscope, Park Systems). Raman spectra was  obtained by Micro-Raman spectrometer system (ALPHA300, WITec Co.) at the MEMS ∙ Sensor Platform Center of Sungkyunkwan University (SKKU) with an excitation laser at 532 nm with a power of 0.5 mW. XPS analysis was also conducted using AR-XPS system (Theta Probe AR-XPS System, ThermoFisher Scientific) with monochromated Al Ka radiation (1486.6 eV). For TEM measurments, the MoS2 film was transferred onto copper (Cu) grids with a lacey carbon support film. Cross-sectional and plan-view TEM images were obtained by aberration corrected TEM(JEM-ARM200F, JEOL Ltd.) with an accelerating voltage of 80 kV. The electrical properties of the MoS2 TFTs were investigated using a semiconductor characterization system (Keithley 4200 SCS, Keithley) and dark box under ambient condition.

Fabrications of MoS2 TFT

The synthesized MoS2 films were patterned via photolithography using mask aligner (MA6, SUSS MicroTec) and oxygen plasma reactive ion etching at 30 sccm and 50 W for 1 min to obtain TFT channels. For the lift-off process, the source and drain were pre-patterned through photolithography and, then, Ti/Au (20 nm/100 nm) were deposited by an electron beam evaporator. After the removal of the unnecessary Ti/Au part, the samples were annealed at 200 °C for 2 h in a vacuum chamber to improve the electrical junctions.

NO2 gas-sensing measurement

The fabricated MoS2 FET-based gas sensors were inserted in a sensing chamber designed to evaluate the electrical properties under a gas flow. Before the gas injection, the vacuum condition (10 mTorr) was applied to remove unnecessary gases. NO2 gas was diluted with N2 gas; the flow rate of the injected gases was controlled by mass flow controllers and the total flow rate was maintained at 1000 sccm for the whole time. Before measuring the electrical properties of the sensors, each sample device was exposed to NO2 gas for 10 min at room temperature.