Exploring intertwined orders in cuprate superconductors

TL;DR

This paper discusses the complex interplay of spin, charge, and superconducting orders in cuprate superconductors, highlighting recent experimental findings and theoretical models that suggest intertwined and competing orders influence high-temperature superconductivity.

Contribution

It provides a comprehensive review of experimental and theoretical insights into intertwined orders in cuprates, emphasizing the role of charge modulations and their relation to superconductivity.

Findings

Spin and charge orders coexist with superconductivity in cuprates.

Charge density wave order peaks at 1/8 hole doping in various cuprates.

Theoretical models suggest pair-density-wave states are energetically competitive.

Abstract

The concept of intertwined orders has been introduced to describe the cooperative relationship between antiferromagnetic spin correlations and electron (or hole) pair correlations that develop in copper-oxide superconductors. This contrasts with systems in which, for example, charge-density-wave (CDW) order competes for Fermi surface area with superconductivity. La$_{2-x}$Ba$_x$CuO$_4$ with $x=0.125$ provides an example in which the ordering of spin stripes coincides with the onset of two-dimensional superconducting correlations. The apparent frustration of the interlayer Josephson coupling has motivated the concept of the pair-density-wave superconductor, a state that theoretical calculations show to be energetically competitive with the uniform $d$-wave superconductor. Even at $x=0.095$, where there is robust superconductivity below 32~K in zero field, the coexistence of strong, low-energy, incommensurate spin excitations implies a spatially modulated and intertwined pair wave function. Recent observations of CDW order in YBa$_2$Cu$_3$O$_{6+x}$ and other cuprate families have raised interesting questions regarding the general role of charge modulations and the relation to superconductivity. While there are differences in the doping dependence of the modulation wave vectors in YBa$_2$Cu$_3$O$_{6+x}$ and La$_{2-x}$Ba$_x$CuO$_4$, the maximum ordering strength is peaked at the hole concentration of 1/8 in both cases. There are also possible connections with the quantum oscillations that have been detected about the same hole concentration but at high magnetic fields. Resolving these relationships remains a research challenge.