Multimodality of Structural, Electrical, and Gravimetric Responses of Intercalated MXenes to Water

Published

November 28, 2017

Author(s)

Eric S. Muckley, Michael Naguib, Hsiu-Wen Wang, Lukas Vlcek, Naresh C. Osti, Robert L. Sacci, Xiahan Sang, Raymond R. Unocic, Yu Xie, Madhu Sudan Tyagi, Eugene Mamontov, Katharine L. Page, Paul R. C. Kent, Jagjit Nanda, Ilia N. Ivanov

Abstract

Understanding of structural, electrical and gravimetric peculiarities of water vapor interaction with ion-intercalated MXenes used to design of a multimodal humidity sensor. Neutron scattering coupled to molecular dynamics and ab initio calculations showed that a small amount of hydration results in a significant increase in the spacing between MXene layers in the presence of K and Mg intercalants between the layers. Films of K and Mg-intercalated MXenes exhibited relative humidity detection thresholds of 0.8% (RH) and showed monotonic RH response in the 0-85% RH range. We found that MXene gravimetric response to water is 10 times faster than their electrical response, suggesting that H₂O-induced swelling/contraction of channels between MXene sheets results in trapping of H₂O molecules that act as charge-depleting dopants. The results demonstrate the first use of MXenes as humidity sensors and infer potential impact of water on structural and electrical performance of MXene-based devices.

Citation

ACS Nano

Volume

11

Issue

11

Pub Type

Journals

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Keywords

neutron scattering, electrical, intercalation, water, dynamics

Citation

Muckley, E. , Naguib, M. , Wang, H. , Vlcek, L. , Osti, N. , Sacci, R. , Sang, X. , Unocic, R. , Xie, Y. , Tyagi, M. , Mamontov, E. , Page, K. , Kent, P. , Nanda, J. and Ivanov, I. (2017), Multimodality of Structural, Electrical, and Gravimetric Responses of Intercalated MXenes to Water, ACS Nano, [online], https://tsapps.nist.gov/publication/get_pdf.cfm?pub_id=923963 (Accessed April 29, 2024)