Synthesis, growth, structure, optical, mechanical, and electrical properties of an Inorganic new nonlinear optical crystal: sodium manganese tetra chloride (SMTC)

A new inorganic nonlinear optical single crystal of sodium manganese tetra chloride (SMTC) has been successfully grown form aqueous solution by the slow evaporation technique at room temperature. The crystals obtained by the above technique were subjected to different characterization analysis. The crystalline nature of the grown crystal of SMTC was analyzed by powder X-ray diffraction. Single crystal X-ray diffraction study reveals that the crystal belongs to orthorhombic system with non-centrosymmetric space group Pbam. Optical transmission study on SMTC crystal shows high transmittance in the entire UV–Vis region and the lower cutoff wavelength is found to be 240 nm. The mechanical strength of the grown crystal was estimated by Vicker'smicrohardness test. The second harmonic generation (SHG) efficiency of the crystal was measured by Kurtz's powder technique infers that the crystal has nonlinear optical (NLO) efficiency 1.32 times that of KDP.The dielectric constant and dielectric loss of the compound were measured at different temperature with varying frequencies. Photoconductivity study confirms that the title compound possesses a negative photoconducting nature. Growth mechanism and surface features of the as grown crystals were analyzed by chemical etching analyzing. (paper)