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arXiv:1708.05771 · Nano Letters

Strongly Cavity-Enhanced Spontaneous Emission from Silicon-Vacancy Centers in Diamond

Jingyuan Linda Zhang, Shuo Sun, Michael J. Burek, Constantin Dory, Yan‐Kai Tzeng, Kevin A. Fischer, Yousif Kelaita, Konstantinos G. Lagoudakis, Marina Radulaski, Zhi‐Xun Shen, Nicholas A. Melosh, Steven Chu, Marko Lončar, Jelena Vuckovic A

Published Jan 29, 2018• 152 citations

Abstract

Quantum emitters are an integral component for a broad range of quantum technologies, including quantum communication, quantum repeaters, and linear optical quantum computation. Solid-state color centers are promising candidates for scalable quantum optics due to their long coherence time and small inhomogeneous broadening. However, once excited, color centers often decay through phonon-assisted processes, limiting the efficiency of single-photon generation and photon-mediated entanglement generation. Herein, we demonstrate strong enhancement of spontaneous emission rate of a single silicon-vacancy center in diamond embedded within a monolithic optical cavity, reaching a regime in which the excited-state lifetime is dominated by spontaneous emission into the cavity mode. We observe 10-fold lifetime reduction and 42-fold enhancement in emission intensity when the cavity is tuned into resonance with the optical transition of a single silicon-vacancy center, corresponding to 90% of the excited-state energy decay occurring through spontaneous emission into the cavity mode. We also demonstrate the largest coupling strength (g/2π = 4.9 ± 0.3 GHz) and cooperativity (C = 1.4) to date for color-center-based cavity quantum electrodynamics systems, bringing the system closer to the strong coupling regime.

DOI: 10.1021/acs.nanolett.7b05075

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We demonstrate cavity-enhanced Raman emission from a single atomic defect in a solid. Our platform is a single silicon-vacancy center in diamond coupled with a monolithic diamond photonic crystal cavity. The cavity enables an unprecedented frequency tuning range of the Raman emission (100 GHz) that significantly exceeds the spectral inhomogeneity of silicon-vacancy centers in diamond nanostructures. We also show that the cavity selectively suppresses the phonon-induced spontaneous emission that degrades the efficiency of Raman photon generation. Our results pave the way towards photon-mediated many-body interactions between solid-state quantum emitters in a nanophotonic platform.

Artificially tailoring quantum emitters by coupling them to optical cavities is critical for applications such as all-photonic quantum computing and quantum key distribution. Among quantum emitters, diamond defect centers, with their atomic-like characteristics, have drawn intense interest for quantum applications. However, the spontaneous emission lifetime of single photons from diamond defects has been limited to several hundred picoseconds, partly due to challenges in realizing cavities in diamond with sufficiently small mode volumes. Here, we sandwich an only 10 nm diamond membrane with implanted negatively charged silicon vacancy centers (SiV – ) between a gold mirror and arrays of nanodisks, resulting in ultrafast single-photon sources with lifetimes as short as 5.5 ps. This corresponds to an improvement in the radiative spontaneous emission rate of over 700-fold, also termed the Purcell factor, and is the result of a greatly enhanced local density of states in the ultrasmall mode-volume cavities. Furthermore, the cavity-coupled single SiV – centers exhibit a 4800-fold photoluminescence enhancement with a single-photon generation rate of up to 361 Mcps at room temperature. These results could refine the engineering of diamond defect centers and position other solid-state platforms as strong quantum-information contenders when coupled to ultrasmall mode-volume cavities, thus illustrating the potential for large-scale, artificially tailored single-photon sources.

Monolithic integration of single-photon sources into silicon photonics offers a compelling solution for realizing scalable quantum telecommunication architectures. Among the candidate silicon color centers, the C-center features a zero-phonon emission in the telecom L-band, corresponding to the spectral window of minimum transmission loss in optical fibers. Despite this advantage, isolating single C-centers has remained an unrealized challenge in solid-state quantum optics. In this work, we report the isolation of a single silicon C-center. We enhance the spontaneous emission rate of the zero-phonon line by coupling the single emitter to a nanophotonic crystal cavity, observing a fivefold reduction in the excited-state lifetime compared to bulk conditions, which corresponds to a Purcell factor lower bound of 33. Second-order autocorrelation measurements confirm single-photon emission from the investigated defect, obtaining an optical purity of

g^{(2)}(0) = 0.23

without background correction. Our results establish a native telecom L-band quantum light source in silicon, laying the foundation for ultra-low-loss and long-distance quantum applications.

Deterministic coupling of single solid-state emitters to nanocavities is the key for integrated quantum information devices. We here fabricate a photonic crystal cavity around a preselected single silicon-vacancy color center in diamond and demonstrate modification of the emitters internal population dynamics and radiative quantum efficiency. The controlled, room-temperature cavity coupling gives rise to a resonant Purcell enhancement of the zero-phonon transition by a factor of 19, coming along with a 2.5-fold reduction of the emitter's lifetime.

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