“…So far, diverse metal oxides, for instance TiO 2 [6,7], ZnO [8,9], WO 3 [10,11], NiO [12,13], and SnO 2 [14,15], have received a lot of attention and been widely investigated. Among them, as a prominent p-type oxide semiconductor with a wide band-gap (3.6–4.0 eV), NiO has captured a tremendous amount of attention for the capability of gases detection due to its distinctive electronic nanostructure and excellent thermal stability [16,17]. However, traditional pristine NiO-based sensors have limited gas-sensing performances such as high working temperature, low sensitivity and unsatisfactory repeatability, which may impose restrictions on the fabrication of high-performance sensors [18].…”