Optical and electro-optical properties of Sn/sub 2/P/sub 2/S/sub 6/

Tin thiohypodiphosphate (Sn/sub 2/Pn/sub 2/S/sub 6/) is a wide bandgap semiconductor ferroelectric with interesting nonlinear optical properties and large electro-optical coefficients. In addition it is also a very attractive photorefractive material showing fast photorefractive grating recording times and large refractive index change in the red and near infrared spectral region. These properties make Sn/sub 2/Pn/sub 2/S/sub 6/ an interesting material for several applications where laser diodes are employed (laser stabilization, beam cleanup, optical phase conjugation). The wide optical transparency range extending from /spl lambda/=0.53 /spl mu/m to /spl lambda/=8 /spl mu/m also allows optical parametric generation of infrared wavelengths not accessible with standard nonlinear optical crystals.