Effect of Annealing Time Process on the pH Sensitivity of Spin-coated TiO2/ ZnO Bilayer Film

This paper presents an investigation on titanium dioxide (TiO2) and zinc oxide (ZnO) bilayer film, which is used as sensing membrane for extended-gate field effect transistor (EGFET) for pH sensing application. TiO2/ZnO thin films were deposited using sol-gel spin coating method on indium tin oxide (ITO) substrates. After the deposition, the bilayer films were annealed at constant temperatures which is 400 °C for 15, 30, 40 and 60 minutes. The sensitivity of the TiO2 thin film towards pH buffer solution was measured by dipping the sensing membrane in pH4, pH7 and pH10 buffer solution. By varying the annealing time, we found that the TiO2/ZnO thin film annealed at 400°C for 15 minutes gave the highest sensitivity compared to other annealing conditions, with the value of 64.87 mV/pH.