Hexanal was identified as one of the major volatile gases which are produced in degraded dairy products and wood industries. Therefore, preliminary study on hexanal gas detection with the laboratory scale was carried out in this paper. Electrical testing with chitosan as a sensing material to sense hexanal gas in low concentration was carried out at room temperature. Chitosan sensor was fabricated by using electrochemical deposition technique to form active sensing layer. The response of the chitosan film sensor (CFS) towards hexanal was tested via electrical testing by exposing different hexanal concentrations ranging between 20 ppm, 100 ppm, 200 ppm, and 300 ppm using air as a carrier gas. Sensing properties of the CFS toward hexanal exposure including responsibility, recovery, repeatability, stability, and selectively were studied. Overall, our result suggested that hexanal sensor based on chitosan was able to perform well at room temperature demonstrated by good response, good recovery, good repeatability, good stability, and good selectively. This simple and low cost sensor has high potential to be utilized in early quality degradation detection in dairy products and can be used to monitor the level of hexanal exposure in wood industries.

Ammonia classified as one of the hazardous chemical to environment and human. Therefore, monitoring the ammonia in air is vital. Chitosan film was selected as a sensing material for ammonia detection in this study. Chitosan powder was dissolved in 2% of acetic acid to form chitosan solution gel. It was subsequently deposited on patterned electrode by using electrochemical deposition technique. The response of the chitosan sensor towards ammonia was tested via electrical testing by exposing different ammonia concentration ranging from 20 ppm, 100 ppm, 200 ppm, and 300 ppm using air exposure technique. The response of the chitosan sensor towards ammonia was recorded as output voltage. Sensor properties which include sensitivity, stability, recovery, and repeatability were studied. The electrical result showed that the response of chitosan sensor increases as the ammonia concentration increases. All the sensing properties were achieved. Finally, the structure characterization of the chitosan was studied using Fourier Transform Infrared Spectroscopy (FTIR). The appearance of N-H and O-H groups in FTIR spectrum of chitosan film provides evidence that the domain functional group exist in chitosan after it was processed into film.

Chloroform classified as one of the hazardous chemical to human. Therefore, monitoring the chloroform concentration in air is vital. In this study, chitosan powder was dissolved in 2% of acetic acid to form chitosan solution gel. It was subsequently deposited on printed circuit board (PCB) by using electrochemical deposition technique. The response of the chitosan sensor towards chloroform was tested via electrical testing by exposing different chloroform concentration ranging from 10 ppm, 20 ppm, 30 ppm, 40 ppm, and 50 ppm using air exposure technique. The response of the chitosan sensor towards chloroform was recorded as output voltage. Sensing properties of the chitosan sensor which include sensitivity, stability, recovery, and repeatability were studied. The electrical result showed that output voltage increases as the concentration of chloroform increases. All the sensing properties were achieved. The structure characterization of the chitosan was studied using Fourier Transform Infrared Spectroscopy (FTIR). The appearance of N-H and O-H groups in FTIR spectrum of chitosan film provides evidence that the domain functional group exist in chitosan after it was processed into film.

Chitosan film dielectrics to produce an electrostatic capacitor were prepared by the solution cast technique. The charging and discharging of the capacitor were done using RC series circuit with DC voltage supply because chitosan has bipolar properties. First testing was by varying supply voltage of 1, 3, 5, 10 and 15 V, respectively, and could be determined that the most effective voltage for chitosan film can be well polarised is 5 V. The results of second testing for the use of 5 V supply showed that the capacitance of a chitosan film capacitor decreased with the increase in load value. For loads of 100, 1K, 10K, 100K and 1M Ω, the capacitance values of the chitosan film capacitor were 3.1725, 0.4136, 0.05379, 0.007917 and 0.001522 F, respectively. It was also found that the increase in voltage of the capacitor at charging process was faster for the lower load. Therefore, the research result has corresponded to the general formula that used to calculate the capacitance value and thus, the biopolymer chitosan has potential as a sustainable green dielectric.

A humidity sensor made of the natural polymer chitosan has been successfully fabricated in the film form by a solution casting method. Humidity testing was performed by placing a chitosan film sensor in a cooling machine room, model KT-2000 Ahu. The testing results showed that the output voltage values of chitosan film sensor increased with the increase in humidity percentage. For the increase in humidity percentage from 30 to 90% showed that the output voltage of chitosan film sensor increased from 32.19 to 138.75 mV. It was also found that the sensor evidenced good repeatability and stability during the testing. Therefore, chitosan has a great potential to be used as new sensing material for the humidity detection of which was cheaper and environmentally friendly.