Bottom up engineering of near-identical quantum emitters in atomically thin materials

TL;DR

This paper presents a bottom-up chemical vapor deposition method to produce large-area, uniform hBN with densely packed single photon emitters, achieving controlled emission wavelengths and electrical tuning, advancing scalable quantum photonic applications.

Contribution

It introduces a novel bottom-up growth technique for uniform, high-density hBN with controlled emission properties, overcoming previous spectral variability issues.

Findings

Over 85% of emitters have a ZPL at 580±10 nm.

Achieved electrical modulation of emission wavelength by up to 15 nm.

Produced 100 emitters per 10x10 μm² area with narrow spectral distribution.

Abstract

Quantum technologies require robust and photostable single photon emitters (SPEs) that can be reliably engineered. Hexagonal boron nitride (hBN) has recently emerged as a promising candidate host to bright and optically stable SPEs operating at room temperature. However, the emission wavelength of the fluorescent defects in hBN has, to date, been shown to be uncontrolled. The emitters usually display a large spread of zero phonon line (ZPL) energies spanning over a broad spectral range (hundreds of nanometers), which hinders the potential development of hBN-based devices and applications. We demonstrate bottom-up, chemical vapor deposition growth of large-area, few layer hBN that hosts large quantities of SPEs: 100 per 10x10 {\mu}m2. Remarkably, more than 85 percent of the emitters have a ZPL at (580{\pm}10)nm, a distribution which is over an order of magnitude narrower than previously reported. Exploiting the high density and uniformity of the emitters, we demonstrate electrical modulation and tuning of the ZPL emission wavelength by up to 15 nm. Our results constitute a definite advancement towards the practical deployment of hBN single photon emitters in scalable quantum photonic and hybrid optoelectronic devices based on 2D materials.