Strong driving of a single spin using arbitrarily polarized fields

TL;DR

This paper experimentally explores strong driving of a single NV center spin with arbitrarily polarized microwave fields, surpassing the rotating wave approximation limit to enable high-fidelity quantum control and enhance quantum information processing.

Contribution

It demonstrates the use of arbitrary polarization microwave fields to drive NV center spins beyond the RWA, enabling arbitrary axis rotations and improved quantum control.

Findings

NV spin can be driven harmonically regardless of field amplitude with circular polarization

The technique extends the RWA limit in quantum sensing and control

Limitations for high-fidelity gates are characterized

Abstract

The strong driving regime occurs when a quantum two-level system is driven with an external field whose amplitude is greater or equal to the energy splitting between the system's states, and is typically identified with the breaking of the rotating wave approximation (RWA). We report an experimental study, in which the spin of a single nitrogen-vacancy (NV) center in diamond is strongly driven with microwave (MW) fields of arbitrary polarization. We measure the NV center spin dynamics beyond the RWA, and characterize the limitations of this technique for generating high-fidelity quantum gates. Using circularly polarized MW fields, the NV spin can be harmonically driven in its rotating frame regardless of the field amplitude, thus allowing rotations around arbitrary axes. Our approach can effectively remove the RWA limit in quantum-sensing schemes, and assist in increasing the number of operations in QIP protocols.