Recent years witness an emergence and a very fast development of a new activity in condensed matter physics. The goal is a controlled transformation of electronic states or even of whole phases by external impacts. There are two main directions: the electrostatic effects of very strong electric fields and the supercritical optical pumping; the latest trend is to employ them in combination.
Using computational and experimental methods, researchers have compared the superconducting properties of layered nickelates and cuprates.