title: Impact of quenched oxygen disorder on charge density wave order in YBa2Cu3O6+x.
abstract: The competition between superconductivity and charge density wave (CDW) order in underdoped cuprates has now been widely reported, but the role of disorder in this competition has yet to be fully resolved. A central question is whether disorder sets the length scale of the CDW order, for instance by pinning charge density fluctuations or disrupting an otherwise long-range order. Using resonant soft x-ray scattering, we investigate the sensitivity of CDW order in YBa2Cu3O6+x (YBCO) to varying levels of oxygen disorder. We find that quench cooling YBCO6.67 (YBCO6.75) crystals to destroy their o-V and o-VIII (o-III) chains decreases the intensity of the CDW superlattice peak by a factor of 1.9 (1.3), but has little effect on the CDW correlation length, incommensurability, and temperature dependence. This reveals that while quenched oxygen disorder influences the CDW order parameter, the spatial extent of the CDW order is insensitive to the level of quenched oxygen disorder and may instead be a consequence of competition with superconductivity.
authors.affiliation: Department of Physics and Astronomy, University of Waterloo, Waterloo N2L 3G1, Canada.
authors.forename: A J
authors.initials: AJ
authors.lastname: Achkar
authors.affiliation: Department of Physics and Astronomy, University of Waterloo, Waterloo N2L 3G1, Canada.
authors.forename: X
authors.initials: X
authors.lastname: Mao
authors.affiliation: Department of Physics and Astronomy, University of Waterloo, Waterloo N2L 3G1, Canada.
authors.forename: Christopher
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: McMahon
authors.affiliation: Canadian Light Source, Saskatoon, Saskatchewan S7N 2V3, Canada.
authors.forename: R
authors.initials: R
authors.lastname: Sutarto
authors.affiliation: Canadian Light Source, Saskatoon, Saskatchewan S7N 2V3, Canada.
authors.forename: F
authors.initials: F
authors.lastname: He
authors.affiliation: Department of Physics and Astronomy, University of British Columbia, Vancouver V6T 1Z1, Canada.
authors.forename: Ruixing
authors.initials: R
authors.lastname: Liang
authors.affiliation: Department of Physics and Astronomy, University of British Columbia, Vancouver V6T 1Z1, Canada.
authors.forename: D A
authors.initials: DA
authors.lastname: Bonn
authors.affiliation: Department of Physics and Astronomy, University of British Columbia, Vancouver V6T 1Z1, Canada.
authors.forename: W N
authors.initials: WN
authors.lastname: Hardy
authors.affiliation: Department of Physics and Astronomy, University of Waterloo, Waterloo N2L 3G1, Canada.
authors.forename: D G
authors.initials: DG
authors.lastname: Hawthorn