Gel growth of 2-amino-5-nitropyridinium dihydrogen phosphate organomineral crystals: X-ray and nonlinear optics characterization

2-Amino-5-nitropyridinium dihydrogen phosphate (2A5NPDP) is an organomineral material presenting interesting quadratic optical nonlinear properties, in particular towards second harmonic generation. Single crystals have been grown by spontaneous nucleation in tetramethoxysilane gel by slow cooling. X-ray characterization provides evidence of their good crystalline quality. Second harmonic generation experiments at 1.34 μm have confirmed the efficiency of these crystals and permitted inferring the d15 and d24 coefficients from the susceptibility tensor.