High nonlinear optical anisotropy of urea nanofibers

• Author(s): Isakov, D. V. ; Gomes, E. de Matos ; Belsley, M. ; Almeida, B. G. ; Martins, Albino ; Neves, N. M. ; Reis, R. L.
• Date: 2010
• Persistent ID: http://hdl.handle.net/1822/14148
• Origin: RepositóriUM - Universidade do Minho
• Subject(s): Nanoscale materials and structures: fabrication and characterization; Polymers, organics; Optical frequency converters
• Document Type: Article
• Language: English

Description

Nanofibers consisting of the optically nonlinear organic molecule urea embedded in both poly(ethylene oxide) (PEO) and poly(vinyl alcohol) (PVA) polymers were produced by the electrospinning technique. The second-harmonic generation produced by aligned fiber mats of these materials displays a strong dependence on the polarization of the incident light. In PVA-urea nanofibers the effectiveness in generating of the second-harmonic light is as high as that of a pure urea powder with an average grain size of 110 μm. The results suggest that single crystalline urea nanofibers were achieved with a long-range crystalline order extending into the range of 2–4 μm with PVA as the host polymer.