Efficient photon coupling from a diamond nitrogen vacancy center by integration with silica fiber

• Main Authors: Patel, Rishi N. (Contributor), Schroder, Tim (Contributor), Wan, Noel Heng Loon (Contributor), Li, Luozhou (Contributor), Mouradian, Sara L (Contributor), Chen, Edward H (Contributor), Englund, Dirk R. (Contributor)
• Other Authors: Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Department of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science (Contributor)
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Published: Nature Publishing Group, 2017-07-27T18:22:14Z.
• Subjects: Article
• Online Access: Get fulltext

 A central goal in quantum information science is to efficiently interface photons with single optical modes for quantum networking and distributed quantum computing. Here, we introduce and experimentally demonstrate a compact and efficient method for the low-loss coupling of a solid-state qubit, the nitrogen vacancy (NV) center in diamond, with a single-mode optical fiber. In this approach, single-mode tapered diamond waveguides containing exactly one high quality NV memory are selected and integrated on tapered silica fibers. Numerical optimization of an adiabatic coupler indicates that near-unity-efficiency photon transfer is possible between the two modes. Experimentally, we find an overall collection efficiency between 16% and 37% and estimate a single photon count rate at saturation above 700 kHz. This integrated system enables robust, alignment-free, and efficient interfacing of single-mode optical fibers with single photon emitters and quantum memories in solids.