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arXiv · 1909.13496

Plasma treatments and photonic nanostructures for shallow nitrogen vacancy centers in diamond

Mariusz Radtke·Lara Render·Richard Nelz·Elke Neu
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Abstract

We investigate the influence of plasma treatments, especially a 0V-bias, potentially low damage O$_2$ plasma as well as a biased Ar/SF$_6$/O$_2$ plasma on shallow, negative nitrogen vacancy (NV$^-$) centers. We ignite and sustain using our 0V-bias plasma using purely inductive coupling. To this end, we pre-treat surfaces of high purity chemical vapor deposited single-crystal diamond (SCD). Subsequently, we create $\sim$10 nm deep NV$^-$ centers via implantation and annealing. Onto the annealed SCD surface, we fabricate nanopillar structures that efficiently waveguide the photoluminescence (PL) of shallow NV$^-$. Characterizing single NV$^-$ inside these nanopillars, we find that the Ar/SF$_6$/O$_2$ plasma treatment quenches NV$^-$ PL even considering that the annealing and cleaning steps following ion implantation remove any surface termination. In contrast, for our 0V-bias as well as biased O$_2$ plasma, we observe stable NV$^-$ PL and low background fluorescence from the photonic nanostructures.

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Mariusz Radtke, Lara Render, Richard Nelz, Elke Neu. 2019-09-30. Plasma treatments and photonic nanostructures for shallow nitrogen vacancy centers in diamond. https://arxiv.org/abs/1909.13496

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