Semicarbazone of p-dimethylamino benzaldehyde (SCPDB) is a new organic material with interesting quadratic nonlinear optical properties, in particular second harmonic generation (SHG). SCPDB was synthesized and single crystals were grown by low temperature solution method. Unit cell parameters were evaluated by single crystal X-ray diffraction technique. The formation of the material was confirmed qualitatively by FT-IR and FT-Raman spectral analyses and its optical transmittance studied. SHG efficiency is found to be comparable to urea. (C) 2003 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.