A Screen-Printed and Light-Activated Copper Oxide Sensor for Acetone Detection

In this work, we report on the design, fabrication, and investigation of a low-power screen-printed Cu₂O/CuO chemiresistive sensor. Typically, copper oxide sensors are fabricated either using microfabrication technologies or by directly depositing copper oxide through solution processes. In contrast, we thermally oxidized commercially available copper ink to develop chemiresistive sensors. This process paves the way for an additive and scalable production of copper oxide-based gas sensors. The sensors were activated with a blue light emitting diode and tested with acetone vapor at room temperature. Based on the evaluated repeatability and linearity, we consider this sensor to be a promising candidate for use in power efficient chemical sensing applications like breath analyzers.