α-BBO (Alpha-Barium Borate)

Catalog NumberOPTIX00002

CategoryBirefringent Crystals

Description	α-BBO serves as a negative uniaxial crystal with significant birefringence, functioning effectively across a wide transparent range from 190 nm to 3500 nm. It is particularly suited for applications involving ultraviolet light and high power due to its robust physical, chemical, thermal, and optical properties, which resemble those of β-BBO. Despite these strengths, α-BBO's central crystal symmetry means it lacks nonlinear optical properties, making it unsuitable for nonlinear optical processes.
Density	3.85 g/cm3
Chemical Formula	α-BaB2O4
Clear Aperture	>90%
Coating	AR-coating or P-coating
Crystal Structure	Trigonal
Damage Threshold	1 GW/cm2 @1064 nm, 10 ns, 10 Hz (AR-coated)
Flatness	λ/4 @633 nm
Hardness	4.5 Mohs
Hygroscopic	Low Hygroscopic Susceptibility
Length	up to 40 mm
Orientation	Optical Axis Orientation: 6 arc min
Parallelism	20 arc sec
Refractive Index	no=1.6776, ne=1.5534, @532 nm; no=1.6579, ne=1.5379, @1064 nm
Sellmeier Equation	no2 = 2.7471 + 0.01878 / (λ2 - 0.01822) - 0.01354 λ2 ne2 = 2.37153 + 0.01224 / (λ2 - 0.01667) - 0.01516 λ2
Size	Aperture up to Φ50 mm
Surface Quality	10/5 to MIL-PRF-13830B
Thermal Expansion Coefficient	-9.3 × 10-6 /℃ (C); -9.5 × 10-6 /℃ (A)
Transparency Range	190 nm-3500 nm
Type	Birefringent Crystals