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Kost, Andreas; Solar, Marcel

doi:10.1007/978-3-658-21783-9_12

Cited by 2 publications

(1 citation statement)

References 7 publications

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“…Sensing weak magnetic fields originating from single or small ensembles of targeted spins has been a subject of intense research over the past years. In particular, the negativelycharged nitrogen-vacancy (NV) center hosted in diamond 1,2 has been proposed [3][4][5] and successfully employed as a magnetic field sensor for nuclear [6][7][8][9][10] and electronic [11][12][13] external spins. Most important, room temperature operation featuring nanometric resolution and sensitivities below nT √ Hz have been shown, 10,14-16 meaning major advances in comparison to other techniques such as standard nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) 17,18 and magnetic resonance force microscopy (MRFM).…”

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confidence: 99%

Toward Optimized Surface δ-Profiles of Nitrogen-Vacancy Centers Activated by Helium Irradiation in Diamond

et al. 2016

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The negatively charged nitrogen-vacancy (NV) center in diamond has been shown recently as an excellent sensor for external spins. Nevertheless, their optimum engineering in the near-surface region still requires quantitative knowledge in regard to their activation by vacancy capture during thermal annealing. To this aim, we report on the depth profiles of near-surface helium-induced NV centers (and related helium defects) by step-etching with nanometer resolution. This provides insights into the efficiency of vacancy diffusion and recombination paths concurrent to the formation of NV centers. It was found that the range of efficient formation of NV centers is limited only to approximately 10 to 15 nm (radius) around the initial ion track of irradiating helium atoms. Using this information we demonstrate the fabrication of nanometric-thin (δ) profiles of NV centers for sensing external spins at the diamond surface based on a three-step approach, which comprises (i) nitrogen-doped epitaxial CVD diamond overgrowth, (ii) activation of NV centers by low-energy helium irradiation and thermal annealing, and (iii) controlled layer thinning by low-damage plasma etching. Spin coherence times (Hahn echo) ranging up to 50 μs are demonstrated at depths of less than 5 nm in material with 1.1% of (13)C (depth estimated by spin relaxation (T1) measurements). At the end, the limits of the helium irradiation technique at high ion fluences are also experimentally investigated.

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