Identification of ferroelectric and antiferroelectric phases by the study of polarization hysteresis loops

The clear identification of ferroelectric and antiferroelectric phases in liquid crystalline compounds is very important for applications of these materials and for the basic knowledge of the structure of these phases. The use of a macroscopic technique, such as the polarization hysteresis loops, is relatively not expensive, reliable and reveals to be a good method to study many of the characteristics of these phases. The evolution of the coercive field with the frequency, the surface and ionic contributions and the cell thickness influence on the shape of the loops is also considered in this work.