Analysis of quadratic electrooptic response of BaTiO3 crystal in ferroelectric phase

Using the example of BaTiO₃ in a ferroelectric phase it is shown that a large difference in magnitudes of individual linear electrooptic coefficients may be a reason of additional indirect quadratic contributions that are independent of real quadratic coefficients. For some directions of the applied field and light, the indirect contributions may be even larger than the real quadratic ones. Independently of nonlinear distortions that can affect applicability of technical devices, a large difference between linear electrooptic coefficients may lead to serious problems in measurements of the real quadratic electrooptic effect. The analysis is based on the extended Jones matrix calculus applied to a Gaussian beam.