Fast and sensitive hydrogen detector

In various embodiments, rapid, sensitive molecular hydrogen detection is achieved by receiving a sample gas including ambient water vapor and hydrogen; passing the sample gas through a gas dryer; chemically converting hydrogen in the sample gas into water vapor to produce a converted sample gas; measuring water vapor in the converted sample gas to generate a water vapor signal; separating the water vapor signal into an ambient water vapor signal and a hydrogen-derived water vapor signal in the time domain, where the gas dryer attenuates a change in the ambient water vapor signal; and outputting a hydrogen signal describing molecular hydrogen in the sample gas based on the hydrogen-derived water vapor signal. 在各种实施例中，如下实现了快速、灵敏的分子氢检测：接收包括环境水蒸气和氢气的样本气体；使样本气体通过气体干燥器；将样本气体中的氢气化学转化为水蒸气以产生转化后的样本气体；测量转化后的样本气体中的水蒸气以产生水蒸气信号；在时域中将水蒸气信号分离成环境水蒸气信号和氢气衍生的水蒸气信号，其中，气体干燥器减弱了环境水蒸气信号的变化；以及基于氢气衍生的水蒸气信号输出描述样本气体中的分子氢的氢气信号。