Universal enhancement of the optical readout fidelity of single electron spins

TL;DR

This paper introduces a universal method to significantly improve the optical readout fidelity of single electron spins in NV centers by leveraging conditional flip-flop processes with the nitrogen nuclear spin, enhancing quantum measurement precision.

Contribution

A novel, universally applicable technique that uses nuclear-electron spin interactions to enhance optical readout fidelity in NV centers.

Findings

Signal-to-noise ratio is significantly improved.

Enhanced readout fidelity achieved through conditional flip-flop processes.

Method is applicable to any nitrogen-vacancy center.

Abstract

Precise readout of spin states is crucial for any approach towards physical realization of a spin-based quantum computer and for magnetometry with single spins. Here, we report a new method to strongly improve the optical readout fidelity of electron spin states associated with single nitrogen-vacancy (NV) centers in diamond. The signal-to-noise ratio is enhanced significantly by performing conditional flip-flop processes between the electron spin and the nuclear spin of the NV center's nitrogen atom. The enhanced readout procedure is triggered by a short preparatory pulse sequence. As the nitrogen nuclear spin is intrinsically present in the system, this method is universally applicable to any nitrogen-vacancy center.