The thresholdless, hysteresis-free V-shape electro-optical switching in surface-stabilized ferroelectric liquid crystals, observed usually with a triangular voltage form, has been shown to be rather an apparent and not a real effect. Strictly speaking, it is observed only at one characteristic frequency $f_i$ and is accompanied by an inversion of the electro-optical hysteresis direction from the normal to the abnormal one. The switching of the director in a liquid crystal layer at $f_i,$ in reality, has a threshold and a normal hysteresis. Even the optical transmittance shows a hysteresis at $f_i$ when it is plotted as a function of the voltage on the liquid crystal layer and not as a function of the total voltage on the liquid crystal cell which always includes the inner insulating layers. Due to these layers, a voltage divider is formed which includes the capacitance of the insulating layers and the dynamic impedance (capacitance and resistance) of the ferroelectric liquid crystal layer. The new explanation has been confirmed by experiments with different ferroelectric liquid crystal cells combined with external resistors and capacitors and by measurements of a strong dependence of $f_i$ on the liquid crystal resistance which was varied over three orders of magnitude. A theoretical analysis of the problem has also been made using certain approximations for material parameters and the space dependence of the sine form of the electric field in the liquid crystal layer. The conclusions are qualitatively consistent with the experimental results. Finally, the dynamic problem has been solved numerically by taking into account of all the relevant parameters (in the absence of flow and irregularities in the cell plane) and the obtained results are in excellent correspondence with the experiment. This has been demonstrated for sets of material and cell parameters providing the best V-shape performance.

• Received 15 November 2001

DOI:https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevE.66.021701