Growth and Characterization of Organic NLO Crystal: β-Naphthol

Single crystals of β-Naphthol (βN), an organic nonlinear optical (NLO) material was successfully grown by temperature lowering method using chloroform as solvent. The initial compound was purified by repeated recrystallization process. As-grown crystals were characterized by single crystal X-ray diffraction (XRD) studies to ascertain that βN crystal crystallized in the monoclinic system with a noncemtrosymmetric space group. Vibrational frequencies of various functional groups in the crystals were derived from Fourier transform infrared (FTIR) spectroscopy and proton nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) spectrum. Optical characterization was done using UV-Visible near-infrared (NIR) spectroscopy. The thermal behaviour of the material was studied by thermo gravimetric and differential thermal plots. Scanning electron microscopy (SEM) study was carried out on the surface of the grown crystals to investigate the nature of defects in the crystal surface and the NLO property of the crystal was tested by Nd:YAG laser as a source.