Femtosecond x rays link melting of charge-density wave correlations and light-enhanced coherent transport in YBa2Cu3O6.6

We use femtosecond resonant soft x-ray diffraction to measure the optically stimulated ultrafast changes of charge-density wave correlations in underdoped YBa2Cu3O6.6. We find that when coherent interlayer transport is enhanced by optical excitation of the apical oxygen distortions, at least 50% of the in-plane charge-density wave order is melted. These results indicate that charge ordering and superconductivity may be competing up to the charge ordering transition temperature, with the latter becoming a hidden phase that is accessible only by nonlinear phonon excitation.