Controlling Photon Emission from Nitrogen Vacancy Centers in Diamond

Abstract

In this thesis we investigate two domains of control over the photonic emission from NV centers. In the first part of the thesis, which focuses on emission control in the spatial domain, we will be exploring the design of a nanophotonic structure that would be able to control the directionality of photon emission from NV centers. We will be using the inverse design methodology known as adjoint optimization to design the structure. Furthermore we will present FDTD simulations to assess the performance of the designed structure and compare its performance with existing structures. We then present some preliminary experimental results from a confocal microscopy setup we built in our lab.

In the second part of the thesis, which focuses on emission control in the spectral domain, we investigate the potential of using single NV centers for photon conversion between the microwave and optical regimes. The conversion between the microwave photons, that couple to superconducting qubits, and optical photons, that are used in long range communication and memories, is an important component in realizing an extended quantum network. In our proposed scheme, we explore the use of Λ system in NV centers coupled to optical and microwave cavities as a platform for efficient conversion between the microwave and optical regimes. We present analytical and numerical simulations to identify the required characteristics of the system to achieve high conversion efficiencies.