Issue 18, 2023

An overview of Mg-based IR nonlinear optical materials

Abstract

Infrared nonlinear optical (IR-NLO) materials play a vital role in generating IR laser output and have significant applications in the fields of communication, medicine, and security. At present, commercial IR-NLO crystals suffer from various performance drawbacks that constrain their range of applications. Therefore, the pursuit of designing and exploring new IR-NLO materials has emerged as an important avenue for the advancement of the IR laser industry. Benefiting from the various structural compositions, wide energy gaps, sufficient second-harmonic-generation intensities, strong laser-induced damage thresholds and favorable phase matching features, Mg-based IR-NLO materials have attracted wide attention in recent years. However, there has not been a specific review of this attractive family. In this overview, the recent advancements of Mg-based IR-NLO materials are summarized. These non-centrosymmetric compounds (including 36 chalcogenides and 4 pnictides) can be categorized into three types based on their chemical compositions: (i) ternary MgGa2Se4, MgSiP2, MgSiAs2, and Mg3Si6As8; (ii) quaternary Li4MgGe2S7, Li2Mg2MIII2S6 (MIII = Si, Ge), AEMg6Ga6S16 (AE = Ca, Sr, Ba), RE6MgSi2S14 (RE = Y, La–Nd, Sm, and Gd–Er), Li2MgMIVSe4 (MIV = Ge, Sn), Na4MgMIII2Se6 (MIII = Si, Ge), Cu2MgMIVQ4 (MIV = Si, Ge; Q = S, Se), MIMg3MIII3Q8 (MI = Na, Cu, Ag; MIII = Al, Ga; Q = S, Se), and Mg2In3Si2P7; and (iii) quinary Ba6Cu1.9Mg1.1Ge4S16 and Ba6Cu1.94Mg1.06Sn4S16. Their solid-state synthesis, crystal structures, optical properties and structure–activity relationships are systematically discussed. Finally, some useful conclusions and outlooks on this topic have been put forward.

Graphical abstract: An overview of Mg-based IR nonlinear optical materials

Article information

Article type
Review Article
Submitted
19 Jun 2023
Accepted
24 Jul 2023
First published
27 Jul 2023
This article is Open Access
Creative Commons BY license

Inorg. Chem. Front., 2023,10, 5244-5257

An overview of Mg-based IR nonlinear optical materials

J. Zhang, M. Ran, X. Wu, H. Lin and Q. Zhu, Inorg. Chem. Front., 2023, 10, 5244 DOI: 10.1039/D3QI01144E

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