BaBiBO4, a novel non-centrosymmetric borate oxide

BaBiBO4, or BaBi(BO3)O, is a novel borate oxide which has been synthesized by solid-state reaction at temperatures below 650 °C and 1 atm pressure. Its crystal structure has been determined from powder X-ray diffraction data and refined from powder neutron diffraction data (non-centrosymmetric Pna21 space group, a=8.5817(7), b=9.6802(7), c=5.1505(4)Å, Z=4). The structure is built of [001] chains of edge-sharing BO3 and BiO5 groups interleaved with Ba2+ cations. The measurement of the nonlinear optical properties of a powder sample by the Kurtz-Perry method yielded an efficiency for second-harmonic generation equal to five times that of KH2PO4.