Return to search

Coherent control of electron spins in diamond for quantum information science and quantum sensing

Thesis: Ph. D., Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Department of Nuclear Science and Engineering, 2016. / This electronic version was submitted by the student author. The certified thesis is available in the Institute Archives and Special Collections. / Cataloged from student-submitted PDF version of thesis. / Includes bibliographical references (pages 115-122). / This thesis introduces and experimentally demonstrates coherent control techniques to exploit electron spins in diamond for applications in quantum information processing and quantum sensing. Specifically, optically-detected magnetic resonance measurements are performed on quantum states of single and multiple electronic spins associated with nitrogen-vacancy centers and other paramagnetic centers in synthetic diamond crystals. We first introduce and experimentally demonstrate the Walsh reconstruction method as a general framework to estimate the parameters of deterministic and stochastic fields with a quantum probe. Our method generalizes sampling techniques based on dynamical decoupling sequences and enables measuring the temporal profile of time-varying magnetic fields in the presence of dephasing noise. We then introduce and experimentally demonstrate coherent control techniques to identify, integrate, and exploit unknown quantum systems located in the environment of a quantum probe. We first locate and identify two hybrid electron-nuclear spins systems associated with unknown paramagnetic centers in the environment of a single nitrogen-vacancy center in diamond. We then prepare, manipulate, and measure their quantum states using cross-polarization sequences, coherent feedback techniques, and quantum measurements. We finally create and detect entangled states of up to three electron spins to perform environment-assisted quantum metrology of time-varying magnetic fields. These results demonstrate a scalable approach to create entangled states of many particles with quantum resources extracted from the environment of a quantum probe. Applications of these techniques range from real-time functional imaging of neural activity at the level of single neurons to magnetic resonance spectroscopy and imaging of biological complexes in living cells and characterization of the structure and dynamics of magnetic materials. / by Alexandre Cooper-Roy. / Ph. D.

Identiferoai:union.ndltd.org:MIT/oai:dspace.mit.edu:1721.1/111688
Date January 2016
CreatorsCooper-Roy, Alexandre
ContributorsPaola Cappellaro., Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Department of Nuclear Science and Engineering., Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Department of Nuclear Science and Engineering.
PublisherMassachusetts Institute of Technology
Source SetsM.I.T. Theses and Dissertation
LanguageEnglish
Detected LanguageEnglish
TypeThesis
Format122 pages, application/pdf
RightsMIT theses are protected by copyright. They may be viewed, downloaded, or printed from this source but further reproduction or distribution in any format is prohibited without written permission., http://dspace.mit.edu/handle/1721.1/7582

Page generated in 0.0016 seconds