Syntheses, characterization and nonlinear optical properties of sodium–scandium carbonate Na5Sc(CO3)4·2H2O

• A new NLO material Na5Sc(CO3)4·2H2O has been successfully grown under a subcritical hydrothermal condition.
• The material was characterized by XRD, UV–vis diffuse reflectance spectroscopy and TGA.
• It exhibits a NLO efficiency of about 1.8 times that of KDP (KH2PO4) standard and is a phase-matchable material.
• The NLO effect originates from the [CO3]2− groups.

A novel nonlinear optical (NLO) material Na5Sc(CO3)4·2H2O has been synthesized under a subcritical hydrothermal condition. The structure is determined by single-crystal X-ray diffraction and further characterized by TG analyses and UV–vis–NIR diffuse reflectance spectrum. It crystallizes in the tetragonal space group P-421c, with a = b = 7.4622(6) Å, C = 11.5928(15) Å. The Second-harmonic generation (SHG) on polycrystalline samples was measured using the Kurtz and Perry technique, which indicated that Na5Sc(CO3)4·2H2O was a phase-matchable material, and its measured SHG coefficient was about 1.8 times as large as that of d36 (KDP). The results from the UV–vis diffuse reflectance spectroscopy study of the powder samples indicated that the short-wavelength absorption edges of Na5Sc(CO3)4·2H2O is about 220 nm, suggesting that this crystal is a promising UV nonlinear optical (NLO) materials.

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