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A possible experimental test of the nonlinear phononics interpretation of light-induced superconductivity

Experimental evidence for a transient enhancement of the superconducting critical temperature in presence of an intense THz or IR pump pulse was ascribed to nonlinear phononics effects. Here I introduce a simple phenomenological Ginzburg-Landau model of this phenomenon, to explore further consequences and possible experimental tests of this interpretation. Upon cooling below Tc in the absence ofTHz pumping, both an abrupt softening of a Raman-active mode frequency and a spontaneous lattice distortion, growing linearly with (Tc - T), are predicted to occur. Numerical estimates for YBa2Cu3O6+x indicate that the frequency softening should be easily observable, whereas the lattice distortion may be too small. Comparison with Raman experiments for YBa2Cu3O6+x is far from conclusive; however very large (up to 18 %) phonon frequency softening below Tc, with behaviour strikingly similar to the predictions of the present model, was observed over 20 years ago in HgBa2Ca3Cu4O10+x; its explanation has been controversial. Light induced superconductivity was never investigated in this material and it may be of interest to explore if it is present and connected, via the mechanism discussed here, to the observed anomalous phonon behaviour.