The bulge in the basal plane area of cuprate superconductors - evidence   for 3a singlet hole pairs
  The bulge in the doping dependence of the basal plane area in hole doped cuprate superconductors is connected with a non-double-occupancy constraint for the oxygen cages in the CuO_2 lattice. This constraint favors the formation of 3a hole pairs growing to filaments with gapless excitations along the (pi, pi) direction. Thus in the pseudogap regime a nodal metal of hole pairs is created. Densest packed 3a hole pairs stabilize the optimum doped state at n =1/6 ~ 0.16. 
J\"urgen R\"ohler