Prediction and measurement of the size-dependent stability of fluorescence in diamond over the entire nanoscale

TL;DR

This paper combines simulations, theory, and experiments to predict how the stability of fluorescent NV defects in nanodiamonds depends on size, temperature, and nitrogen concentration, crucial for quantum and biomedical applications.

Contribution

It provides the first comprehensive, generic model predicting the size-dependent stability of NV defects in nanodiamonds across various conditions.

Findings

Size, temperature, and nitrogen levels significantly affect defect stability.

The model accurately predicts experimental stability measurements.

Guidelines for optimizing nanodiamond defect stability for applications.

Abstract

Fluorescent defects in non-cytotoxic diamond nanoparticles are candidates for qubits in quantum computing, optical labels in biomedical imaging and sensors in magnetometry. For each application these defects need to be optically and thermodynamically stable, and included in individual particles at suitable concentrations (singly or in large numbers). In this letter, we combine simulations, theory and experiment to provide the first comprehensive and generic prediction of the size, temperature and nitrogen-concentration dependent stability of optically active NV defects in nanodiamonds.