Detecting and polarizing nuclear spins with double resonance on a single electron spin

TL;DR

This paper demonstrates room-temperature detection and polarization of individual nuclear spins in diamond using a single NV center and double resonance techniques, enabling high-sensitivity nanoscale magnetic resonance imaging.

Contribution

It introduces a method employing Hartmann-Hahn double resonance to enhance nuclear spin detection and polarization at the single-spin level.

Findings

Coherent oscillations observed between NV center and nuclear spin

Nuclear bath cooling extends NV coherence time by over five times

Proof-of-principle for nanoscale magnetic resonance imaging

Abstract

We report the detection and polarization of nuclear spins in diamond at room temperature by using a single nitrogen-vacancy (NV) center. We use Hartmann-Hahn double resonance to coherently enhance the signal from a single nuclear spin while decoupling from the noisy spin-bath, which otherwise limits the detection sensitivity. As a proof-of-principle we: (I) observe coherent oscillations between the NV center and a weakly coupled nuclear spin, (II) demonstrate nuclear bath cooling which prolongs the coherence time of the NV sensor by more than a factor of five. Our results provide a route to nanometer scale magnetic resonance imaging, and novel quantum information processing protocols.