AMoO3(IO3) (A = Na and K): Two promising optical materials via properly assembling the Λ-shaped basic building units

Herein, we reported two alkali metal molybdenum(VI) iodates, namely, NaMoO3(IO3) and γ-KMoO3(IO3) with 1D and 3D [MoO3(IO3)]− anionic architectures, respectively. The novel 1D chain in NaMoO3(IO3) and the 3D network in γ-KMoO3(IO3) are constructed by the 0D Λ-shaped cis-[MoO4(IO3)2]4− building units interconnected by bridging IO3− anions as well as the corner-sharing of oxo anions. Importantly, the polar γ-KMoO3(IO3) exhibits a very large second-harmonic generation (SHG) effect of 12 × KH2PO4 (KDP) under 1064 nm laser radiation, a high laser-Induced damage threshold value (52 × AgGaS2), and a moderate birefringence of [email protected] nm, whereas the centrosymmetric NaMoO3(IO3) has a large birefringence of [email protected] nm. This study further proves the useful route of exploring promising optical materials via assembling the 0D basic building units into higher dimensional anionic architectures.