The development of a simple, low-cost sensor for the effective sensing of multiple gases in industrial or residential zones has been in high demand in recent days. In this article, we have proposed an optical sensor for the dual sensing of oxygen (O₂) and ammonia (NH₃) gases, which consists of oxygen and ammonia-sensitive fluorescent dyes coated individually on both sides of a glass substrate. An ethyl cellulose (EC) matrix doped with platinum (II) meso-tetrakis (pentafluorophenyl) porphyrin (PtTFPP) serves as the oxygen-sensing material, whereas the NH₃-sensing material includes an eosin Y fluorescent indicator immobilized within a cellulose acetate (CA) matrix. Both the oxygen and ammonia-sensitive materials were excited by the same LED light source with a 405 nm peak wavelength, while the corresponding emissions were detected separately for the selective sensing of the gases under study. The dual gas sensor exhibits maximum sensitivities of around 60 and 20 for oxygen and ammonia gases, respectively. The high sensitivity and selectivity of the proposed optical dual sensor suggests the feasibility of the simultaneous sensing of oxygen and ammonia for practical applications.

Simultaneous sensing of multiple gases by a single fluorescent-based gas sensor is of utmost importance for practical applications. Such sensing is strongly hindered by cross-sensitivity effects. In this study, we propose a novel analysis method to ameliorate such hindrance. The trial sensor used here was fabricated by coating platinum(II) meso-tetrakis(pentafluorophenyl)porphyrin (PtTFPP) and eosin-Y dye molecules on both sides of a filter paper for sensing O₂ and NH₃ gases simultaneously. The fluorescent peak intensities of the dyes can be quenched by the analytes and this phenomenon is used to identify the gas concentrations. Ideally, each dye is only sensitive to one gas species. However, the fluorescent peak related to O₂ sensing is also quenched by NH₃ and vice versa. Such cross-sensitivity strongly hinders gas concentration detection. Therefore, we have studied this cross-sensitivity effect systematically and thus proposed a new analysis method for accurate estimation of gas concentration. Comparing with a traditional method (neglecting cross-sensitivity), this analysis improves O₂-detection error from −11.4% ± 34.3% to 2.0% ± 10.2% in a mixed background of NH₃ and N₂.