In order to improve the gas sensing properties, hydroxyapatite (HAp)-based composites were prepared by mixing with different contents of conductive polymers: polypyrrole (PPy) and polyaniline (PAni). The compositions, microstructures and phase constitutions of polymer/HAp composites were characterized, and the sensing properties were studied using a chemical gas sensing (CGS-8) system. The results showed that, compared to pure HAp, the sensitivities of the composites to ammonia were improved significantly. 5%PPy/HAp and 20%PAni/HAp composites exhibited the best sensitivities to ammonia, and the sensitivities at 500ppm were 86.72% and 86.18%, respectively. Besides, the sensitivity of 5%PPy/HAp at 1000ppm was up to 90.7%. Compared to pure PPy and PAni, the response and the recovery time of 5%PPy/HAp and 20%PAni/HAp at 200ppm were shortened several times, and they were 24s/245s and 15s/54s, respectively. In addition, the composites showed a very high selectivity to ammonia. The mechanism for the enhancement of the sensitivity to ammonia was also discussed. The polymer/HAp composites are very promising in applications of ammonia sensors.

The main goal of this work is to explore the possibility of using Au-modified hydroxyapatite (HA) as a potential sensor material. Tube-like HA structure was fabricated with the aid of a Nafion N-117 cation exchange membrane and gold (Au) nanoparticles were added by a hydrothermal method. The morphology, structure and composition were characterized by scanning electron microscopy (SEM), transmission electron microscopy (TEM), X-ray diffraction (XRD), and X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS). The gas sensing properties were also investigated. Results show that Au nanoparticles are dispersed into the HA powder, which is tube-like, with rough inner and outer surfaces. Compared with pure HA, Au-modified HA exhibits improved sensing properties for NH3. 5% (mass fraction) Au-modified HA shows the highest response with relatively short response/recovery time. The response is up to 79.2% when the corresponding sensor is exposed to 200×10-6 NH3 at room temperature, and the response time and recovery time are 20 s and 25 s, respectively. For lower concentration, like 50×10-6, the response is still up to 70.8%. Good selectivity and repeatability are also observed. The sensing mechanism of high response and selectivity for NH3 gas was also discussed. These results suggest that Au-HA composite is a promising material for NH3 sensors operating at room temperature.

Tubular hydroxyapatite was synthesized and showed high response, selectivity, good reproducibility and short response and recovery time to ammonia.

Platy potassium magnesium titanate (K0.8Mg0.4Ti1.6O4, KMTO) was synthesized by a flux method. The potential application of KMTO in removing copper ions from water pollutants was investigated. The crystal phases of specimens were identified by XRD. The morphology and structural information were characterized by SEM and TEM. The adsorption behavior under different conditions was investigated, including different pH values and different initial copper ion concentrations. The results show that the maximum adsorption capacity of Cu(II) ions is 290.697 mg/g, and almost 99.9% of Cu(II) ions can be removed, which is much higher than that of other sorbents reported. The kinetics of KMTO for the adsorption of Cu(II) ions was studied and the best fit can be obtained by the pseudo-second-order model. Adsorption isothermal data can be well interpreted by the Freundlich equation (R2=0.991). In conclusion, this study highlights that KMTO is a potential material for the efficient removal of heavy metal ions in polluted water. It also opens up a new opportunity for the applications of platy KMTO.

In this work, needle-like and micro-spherical agglomerates of nanocrystalline hydroxyapatite (HA) were successfully assembled on the surface of graphene sheets with the aid of dopamine having two roles, as a template and a reductant for graphite oxide during the process of self-polymerization. The crystalline structure and micromorphology of HA can be conveniently regulated by controlling the mineralization route either with a precipitation (cHA/GR) or biomimetic methodology (bHA/GR). Both the composites exhibit improvements of ∼150% and ∼250% in sensitivity towards the sensing of ammonia at room temperature, compared with that of bare graphene. The combination of the multi-adsorption capability of HA and the electric conductivity of graphene is proposed to be the major reason for the observed enhancements. Gas sensing tests demonstrated that the HA/GR composites exhibit excellent selectivity, high sensitivity and repeatable stability towards the analytical sensing of ammonia.