This work shows a study of the periodic ferroelectric domains formed in LiNbO 3 crystals doped with rare earths by means of scanning near field optical microscopy (SNOM) technique. It has been observed periodic structures associated with ferroelectric domains with an unexpected high value of the optical contrast working under reflectance SNOM mode. From Raman-Nath diffraction patterns, a refractive index modulation of ∆n ~10 -4 has been calculated. These results were correlated with the

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... ctric periodic domains obtained by the SNOM technique. A light waveguide effects along the ferroelectric domains is suggested to explain the high reflectance contrast observed in SNOM experiments.