No Arabic abstract
Sensing static or slowly varying magnetic fields with high sensitivity and spatial resolution is critical to many applications in fundamental physics, bioimaging and materials science. Several versatile magnetometry platforms have emerged over the past decade, such as electronic spins associated with Nitrogen Vacancy (NV) centers in diamond. However, their high sensitivity to external fields also makes them poor sensors of DC fields. Indeed, the usual method of Ramsey magnetometry leaves them prone to environmental noise, limiting the allowable interrogation time to the short dephasing time T2*. Here we introduce a hybridized magnetometery platform, consisting of a sensor and ancilla, that allows sensing static magnetic fields with interrogation times up to the much longer T2 coherence time, allowing significant potential gains in field sensitivity. While more generally applicable, we demonstrate the method for an electronic NV sensor and a nuclear ancilla. It relies on frequency upconversion of transverse DC fields through the ancilla, allowing quantum lock-in detection with low-frequency noise rejection. In our experiments, we demonstrate sensitivities better than 6uT/vHz, comparable to the Ramsey method, and narrow-band signal noise filtering better than 64kHz. With technical optimization, we expect more than an one order of magnitude improvement in each of these parameters. Since our method measures transverse fields, in combination with the Ramsey detection of longitudinal fields, it ushers in a compelling technique for sensitive vector DC magnetometry at the nanoscale.
We present a protocol to achieve double quantum magnetometry at large static magnetic fields. This is a regime where sensitive sample parameters, such as the chemical shift, get enhanced facilitating their characterization. In particular, our method delivers two-tone stroboscopic radiation patterns with modulated Rabi frequencies to achieve larger spectral signals. Furthermore, it does not introduce inhomogeneous broadening in the sample spectrum preventing signal misinterpretation. Moreover, our protocol is designed to work under realistic conditions such as the presence of moderate microwave power and errors on the radiation fields. Albeit we particularise to nitrogen vacancy centers, our protocol is general, thus applicable to distinct quantum sensors.
We demonstrate sensing of inhomogeneous dc magnetic fields by employing entangled trapped ions, which are shuttled in a segmented Paul trap. As textit{sensor states}, we use Bell states of the type $left|uparrowdownarrowright>+text{e}^{text{i}varphi}left|downarrowuparrowright>$ encoded in two $^{40}$Ca$^+$ ions stored at different locations. Due to the linear Zeeman effect, the relative phase $varphi$ serves to measure the magnetic field difference between the constituent locations, while common-mode fluctuations are rejected. Consecutive measurements on sensor states encoded in the $text{S}_{1/2}$ ground state and in the $text{D}_{5/2}$ metastable state are used to separate an ac Zeeman shift from the linear dc Zeeman effect. We measure magnetic field differences over distances of up to $6.2~text{mm}$, with accuracies of around 300~fT, sensitivities down to $12~text{pT} / sqrt{text{Hz}}$, and spatial resolutions down to $10~text{nm}$. For optimizing the information gain while maintaining a high dynamic range, we implement an algorithm for Bayesian frequency estimation.
Solid-state spin systems including nitrogen-vacancy (NV) centers in diamond constitute an increasingly favored quantum sensing platform. However, present NV ensemble devices exhibit sensitivities orders of magnitude away from theoretical limits. The sensitivity shortfall both handicaps existing implementations and curtails the envisioned application space. This review analyzes present and proposed approaches to enhance the sensitivity of broadband ensemble-NV-diamond magnetometers. Improvements to the spin dephasing time, the readout fidelity, and the host diamond material properties are identified as the most promising avenues and are investigated extensively. Our analysis of sensitivity optimization establishes a foundation to stimulate development of new techniques for enhancing solid-state sensor performance.
Nitrogen vacancy (NV) centers in diamond have developed into a powerful solid-state platform for compact quantum sensors. However, high sensitivity measurements usually come with additional constraints on the pumping intensity of the laser and the pulse control applied. Here, we demonstrate high sensitivity NV ensemble based magnetic field measurements with low-intensity optical excitation. DC magnetometry methods like, e.g., continuous-wave optically detected magnetic resonance and continuously excited Ramsey measurements combined with lock-in detection, are compared to get an optimization. Gradiometry is also investigated as a step towards unshielded measurements of unknown gradients. The magnetometer demonstrates a minimum detectable field of 0.3-0.7 pT in a 73 s measurement by further applying a flux guide with a sensing dimension of 2 mm, corresponding to a magnetic field sensitivity of 2.6-6 pT/Hz^0.5. Combined with our previous efforts on the diamond AC magnetometry, the diamond magnetometer is promising to perform wide bandwidth magnetometry with picotesla sensitivity and a cubic-millimeter sensing volume under ambient conditions.
Under ideal conditions, quantum metrology promises a precision gain over classical techniques scaling quadratically with the number of probe particles. At the same time, no-go results have shown that generic, uncorrelated noise limits the quantum advantage to a constant factor. In frequency estimation scenarios, however, there are exceptions to this rule and, in particular, it has been found that transversal dephasing does allow for a scaling quantum advantage. Yet, it has remained unclear whether such exemptions can be exploited in practical scenarios. Here, we argue that the transversal-noise model applies to the setting of recent magnetometry experiments and show that a scaling advantage can be maintained with one-axis-twisted spin-squeezed states and Ramsey-interferometry-like measurements. This is achieved by exploiting the geometry of the setup that, as we demonstrate, has a strong influence on the achievable quantum enhancement for experimentally feasible parameter settings. When, in addition to the dominant transversal noise, other sources of decoherence are present, the quantum advantage is asymptotically bounded by a constant, but this constant may be significantly improved by exploring the geometry.