Probing charge dynamics in diamond with an individual color center

Abstract

Control over the charge states of color centers in solids is necessary in order to fully utilize them in quantum technologies. However, the microscopic charge dynamics of deep defects in wide-bandgap semiconductors are complex, and much remains unknown. Here, we utilize single shot charge state readout of an individual nitrogen-vacancy (NV) center to probe charge dynamics of the surrounding defects in diamond. We show that the NV center charge state can be converted through the capture of holes produced by optical illumination of defects many microns away. With this method, we study the optical charge conversion of silicon-vacancy (SiV) centers and provide evidence that the dark state of the SiV center under optical illumination is SiV2-. These measurements illustrate that charge carrier generation, transport, and capture are important considerations in the design and implementation of quantum devices with color centers, and provide a novel way to probe and control charge dynamics in diamond.

arXiv commentMain text: 18 pages, 4 figures, 32 references. Supporting Information: 20 pages, 9 figures, 2 tables, 12 references

References in corpus (26)

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• Charge transfer effects, thermo- and photochromism in single crystal CVD synthetic diamond
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Cited by in corpus (4)

• Coherence of a charge stabilised tin-vacancy spin in diamond
• Room-temperature photo-chromism of silicon vacancy centers in CVD diamond
• Neutral Silicon Vacancy Centers in Diamond via Photoactivated Itinerant Carriers
• Probing itinerant carrier dynamics at the diamond surface using single nitrogen vacancy centers