The main scope of our research is to understand lattice and vibrational dynamics of polar materials, like ferroelectrics, relaxors, biological macromolecules, etc., which are usually probed with laser beam as a function of temperature, under external electric field, and pressure. The main focus is on critical dynamics related to ferroelectric and other relaxation-like phase transitions in ferroelectrics and relaxors, studying temperature- and frequency-dependent soft modes and relaxations in the vicinity of phase transitions. Other topics studied within this research area cover e.g. lattice-mode-coupling phenomena in ferroelectrics, local modes in strongly anharmonic crystals, and geometric resonances coming from ferroelectric domain structure in domain-engineered ferroelectrics.