Abstract

Early theoretical¹ and experimental^2,3 research has pointed out the interest in highly extended conjugated molecules, such as polyenes, for optimization of microscopic second- (respectively, third-) order polarizabilities β (respectively, γ). We report here extensive experimental investigation of the influence of the number n of G = C double bonds and of end-chain electron donor (D) and electron acceptor (A) substituents on y values of various polyenic molecules sketched in Fig. 1, In the case of symmetrical molecules, the electric-field- induced second-harmonic (EFISH) generation (respectively, third-harmonic generation (THG)] technique at 1.34 μm (respectively, 1.9 μm) is used.

© 1993 Optical Society of America