A New Type of Organic Ferroelectric Material Based on Maleopimaric Acid Anhydride

In this paper, maleopimaric acid anhydride (MPA) has been synthesized by the Diels-Alder addition reaction between abietic acid and maleic anhydride. Single crystal X-ray diffraction analysis reveals that MPA crystallizes in the polar space groupP21and contains one MPA and one DMF (Dimethylformamide) molecule in the asymmetric unit. MPA is firstly found to be a new type of low-molecular-mass organic ferroelectric with the saturation spontaneous polarization (Ps) about 60.0-61.6μC·cm-2for single crystal samples, which is close to that of typical inorganic ferroelectric materials. MPA·DMF also shows second-order NLO property, with the second harmonic generation (SHG) responses approximately 0.5 times that of urea.