Response of charge stripes to uniaxial stress in La_1.475Nd_0.4Sr_0.125CuO₄

The La-based '214' cuprates host several symmetry breaking phases including superconductivity, charge and spin order in the form of stripes, and a structural othorhombic to tetragonal phase transition. Therefore, these materials provide and ideal system to study the effects of uniaxial stress onto the various correlations that pervade the cuprate phase diagram. We report resonant x-ray scattering experiments on La_1.475Nd_0.4Sr_0.125CuO₄ (LNSCO-125) that reveal a significant response of charge stripes to uniaxial stress.The observed effects include depinning of the charge stripes alongside the suppression of the structural phase transition, competition between superconductivity and charge order, and a tendency for stripes to form along the direction of applied stress. Altogether, we observe a dramatic response of the electronic properties of LNSCO-125 to the explicit broken symmetry induced by uniaxial stress.