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arXiv:1905.03363

Highly efficient light extraction and directional emission from diamond color centers using planar Yagi-Uda antennas

Hossam Galal, Assegid M. Flatae, S. Lagomarsino, Schulte, Gregor, Christoph Wild, E. Wörner, N. Gelli, S. Sciortino, Holger Schönherr, L. Giuntini, Mario Agio

Published May 8, 2019• 6 citations
arXivHTMLPDF

Abstract

Color centers in diamond represent a promising platform for developing solid-state single-photon sources and spin-photon interfaces as building blocks for photonics-based quantum technologies. However, although they exhibit a combination of features that make them so attractive, they also suffer from limited control in their emission properties, such as brightness, directionality, and polarization to cite a few. In this paper we present implementations and the experimental investigation of planar Yagi-Uda antennas in diamond, demonstrating highly efficient light extraction and directional emission from silicon-vacancy color centers created in thin diamond membranes.

DOI
10.48550/arxiv.1905.03363

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Color centers in diamond represent a promising platform for developing solid-state single-photon sources and spin-photon interfaces as building blocks for photonics-based quantum technologies. However, although they exhibit a combination of features that make them so attractive, they also suffer from limited control in their emission properties, such as brightness, directionality, and polarization to cite a few. In this paper we present implementations and the experimental investigation of planar Yagi-Uda antennas in diamond, demonstrating highly efficient light extraction and directional emission from silicon-vacancy color centers created in thin diamond membranes.
Color centers in diamond, specifically the group-IV-vacancy centers, have emerged as promising candidates among solid state qubits. Among these, the tin-vacancy (SnV) center features the optimum combination of long spin coherence time and favorable optical properties. We here investigate the generation of indistinguishable single photons from SnV centers and explore the influence of residual spectral diffusion. To improve the photon collection efficiency we fabricate a planar optical antenna based on two silver mirrors coated on a thin (sub-µm) single crystal diamond membrane. We demonstrate its operation at room and cryogenic temperatures and strong enhancement of the collectible photon rate.
An efficient atom–photon interface is a key requirement for the integration of solid-state emitters, such as color centers in diamond, into quantum technology applications. As other solid-state emitters, however, their emission into free space is severely limited due to the high refractive index of the bulk host crystal. In this work, we present a planar optical antenna based on two silver mirrors coated on a thin single crystal diamond membrane, forming a planar Fabry–Pérot cavity that improves the photon extraction from single tin vacancy (SnV) centers and their coupling to an excitation laser. Upon numerical optimization of the structure, we find theoretical enhancements in the collectible photon rate by a factor of 60 as compared to the bulk case. As a proof-of-principle demonstration, we fabricate single crystal diamond membranes with sub-μm thickness and create SnV centers by ion implantation. Employing off-resonant excitation, we show a sixfold enhancement of the collectible photon rate, yielding up to half a million photons per second from a single SnV center. At the same time, we observe a significant reduction of the required excitation power in accordance with theory, demonstrating the functionality of the cavity as an optical antenna. Due to its planar design, the antenna simultaneously provides similar enhancements for a large number of emitters inside the membrane. Furthermore, the monolithic structure provides high mechanical stability and straightforwardly enables operation under cryogenic conditions as required in most spin–photon interface implementations.
Tunable photonic architectures that improve the extraction efficiency of light from embedded epitaxial quantum dots across a wide spectral range are key enablers for developing bright sources of single and indistinguishable photons. In this study, we experimentally demonstrate planar multilayer antenna structures consisting of epitaxially grown AlGaAs and InGaAs membranes containing quantum dots sandwiched between metallic Au (or Ag) reflector and director layers together with Al2_22​O3_33​ spacer layers. We show that the linewidths and fine-structure splitting of the neutral exciton emission remain comparable to those measured in the corresponding unprocessed samples, demonstrating that the fabrication process preserves the optical quality of the emitters. In addition to broadband operation, we demonstrate that the planar architecture is compatible with electrical tuning via integrated diode structures, and strain tuning using piezoelectric actuators. In spite of limitations related to optical losses in the ultrathin metallic layers, the demonstrated fabrication simplicity, scalability, and compatibility with tunable quantum emitters establish planar antennas as a promising platform for solid-state quantum photonic devices.
Single-color centers in thin polycrystalline diamond membranes allow the platform to be used in integrated quantum photonics, hybrid quantum systems, and other complex functional materials. While single-crystal diamond membranes are still technologically challenging to fabricate as they cannot be grown on a non-diamond substrate, free-standing polycrystalline diamond membranes can be conveniently fabricated at large-scale from nanocrystalline diamond seeds on a substrate that can be selectively etched. However, their practical application for quantum photonics is so far limited by crystallographic defects, impurities, graphitic grain boundaries, small grain sizes, scattering loss, and strain. In this paper, we report on a single-photon source based on silicon-vacancy color centers in a polycrystalline diamond membrane. We discuss the spectroscopic approach and quantify the photon statistics, obtaining a g2(0) ≈ 0.04. Our findings hold promise for introducing polycrystalline diamond to quantum photonics and hybrid quantum systems.
Silicon-vacancy (SiV) color centers in diamond offer novel possibilities to probe light-matter interaction in nano-quantum optics and provide a scalable quantum system suitable for single-photon emission. However, their effective count-rate is still limited by non-radiative decay channels, radiation at wide angles and total internal reflection at the diamond interface. Recently optical antennas have been utilized in order to modify light-matter interaction at the nanoscale. Acting as resonators, they are able to increase the spontaneous emission rate of quantum emitters by several orders of magnitude in a broad spectral range. Because coupling a quantum emitter to a nano-antenna requires close proximity between the two systems, we implant Si ions on very thin diamond membranes that provide the required dimension for near-field interaction in a controlled manner and investigate the optical properties of SiV color centers in such diamond membranes. We consider gold nano-cones as nano-antennas, fabricated by focused electron beam induced deposition (EBID), followed by sputtering and focused ion beam (FIB) milling. The finite-difference time-domain (FDTD) calculations show that gold nano-cones can provide more than four orders of magnitude enhancement in the Purcell factor with an antenna efficiency (AE) of 80%.
We use crystalline silicon (Si) antennas to efficiently extract broadband single-photon fluorescence from shallow nitrogen-vacancy (NV) centers in diamond into free space. Our design features relatively easy-to-pattern high-index Si resonators on the diamond surface to boost photon extraction by overcoming total internal reflection and Fresnel reflection at the diamond-air interface and providing modest Purcell enhancement, without etching or otherwise damaging the diamond surface. In simulations, ∼17 times more single photons are collected from a single NV center compared to the case without the antenna; in experiments, we observe an enhancement of ∼9 times, limited by spatial alignment between the NV and the antenna. Our approach can be readily applied to other color centers in diamond, and more generally to the extraction of light from quantum emitters in wide-bandgap materials.