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A diamond nanowire single-photon source

Nature Nanotechnology volume 5, pages 195–199 (2010)Cite this article

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Abstract

The development of a robust light source that emits one photon at a time will allow new technologies such as secure communication through quantum cryptography1. Devices based on fluorescent dye molecules2, quantum dots3 and carbon nanotubes4 have been demonstrated, but none has combined a high single-photon flux with stable, room-temperature operation. Luminescent centres in diamond5,6,7,8,9 have recently emerged as a stable alternative, and, in the case of nitrogen-vacancy centres, offer spin quantum bits with optical readout10,11,12,13,14,15. However, these luminescent centres in bulk diamond crystals have the disadvantage of low photon out-coupling. Here, we demonstrate a single-photon source composed of a nitrogen-vacancy centre in a diamond nanowire, which produces ten times greater flux than bulk diamond devices, while using ten times less power. This result enables a new class of devices for photonic and quantum information processing based on nanostructured diamond, and could have a broader impact in nanoelectromechanical systems, sensing and scanning probe microscopy.

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Figure 1: Single-photon source based on an NV centre in a diamond nanowire.
Figure 2: Confocal microscopy of an array of diamond nanowires containing NV centres.
Figure 3: Non-classical light emission from an NV centre in a diamond nanowire.
Figure 4: Comparison between diamond nanowire and bulk diamond crystal single-photon sources.

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  • 23 February 2010

    In the version of this Letter initially published online, the fourth sentence of the abstract was incorrect. This error has been corrected in all versions of the text.

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Acknowledgements

The authors would like to thank F. Huber for providing Fig. 1b. Helpful discussions with Q. Quan, E. Togan, I. Bulu, M. Lukin and F. Jelezko are acknowledged. We would also like to thank S. Hong, M. Grinolds, P. Maletinsky and A. Yacoby for confirmation of the ESR signal. Devices were fabricated in the Center for Nanoscale Systems (CNS) at Harvard. This work was supported in part by grants from National Science Foundation (awards ECCS-0708905 and PHY-0646094: Nanoscale Science and Engineering Center and ECCS-0708905) and the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (Quantum Entanglement Science and Technology program). T.B. is funded by the NDSEG and NSF fellowships.

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The views, opinions and/or findings contained in this publication are those of the author and should not be interpreted as representing the official views or policies, either expressed or implied, of the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency or the Department of Defense.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. School of Engineering and Applied Science, Harvard University, Cambridge, 02138, Massachusetts, USA

    Thomas M. Babinec, Birgit J. M. Hausmann, Mughees Khan, Yinan Zhang & Marko Lončar

  2. Department of Physics, Technische Universität München, Garching, D-85748, Germany

    Birgit J. M. Hausmann

  3. Department of Physics, Harvard University, Cambridge, 02138, Massachusetts, USA

    Jeronimo R. Maze

  4. Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering, Texas A&M University, College Station, 77843, Texas, USA

    Philip R. Hemmer

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Contributions

T.B. performed the experiments and analysed the data, B.H. and M.K. fabricated the diamond nanowire devices, and Y.Z. performed numerical modelling of the structure. J.M. contributed experimental tools and helped with the experiments. P.R.H. and M.L. conceived and designed the experiments. T.B. and M.L. wrote the paper. All authors discussed the results and commented on the manuscript.

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Correspondence to Marko Lončar.

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The authors declare no competing financial interests.

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Babinec, T., Hausmann, B., Khan, M. et al. A diamond nanowire single-photon source. Nature Nanotech 5, 195–199 (2010). https://doi.org/10.1038/nnano.2010.6

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