Polarization anomalies in a relaxor ferroelectric

With a strontium barium niobate crystal used as an example, it is experimentally demonstrated that relaxor ferroelectrics exhibit pronounced polarization anomalies, which manifest themselves in the difference between the trajectories of the dielectric hysteresis observed in several repeated cycles of a varying external electric field. These anomalies originate from the nonuniformity of the relaxor composition, local symmetry lowering, local internal electric field, and a wide distribution of potential barriers in energy for the polarized regions. The anomalies can be observed only in slowly varying (quasistatic) or constant electric fields.