  We study, using a perturbative renormalization group technique, the phase
diagrams of bond-aligned and diagonal Hubbard ladders defined as sections of a
square lattice with nearest-neighbor and next-nearest-neighbor hopping. We find
that for not too large hole doping and small next-nearest-neighbor hopping the
bond-aligned systems exhibit a fully spin-gapped phase while the diagonal
systems remain gapless. Increasing the next-nearest-neighbor hopping typically
leads to a decrease of the gap in the bond-aligned ladders, and to a transition
into a gapped phase in the diagonal ladders. Embedding the ladders in an
antiferromagnetic environment can lead to a reduction in the extent of the
gapped phases. These findings suggest a relation between the orientation of
hole-rich stripes and superconductivity as observed in LSCO.

Strongly Correlated Electrons;Superconductivity