Photoionisation detection of a single Er3+ ion with sub-100-ns time resolution

Yangbo Zhang; Wenda Fan; Jiliang Yang; Hao Guan; Qi Zhang; Xi Qin; Changkui Duan; Gabriele G de Boo; Brett C Johnson; Jeffrey C McCallum; Matthew J Sellars; Sven Rogge; Chunming Yin; Jiangfeng Du

doi:10.1093/nsr/nwad134

Photoionisation detection of a single Er³⁺ ion with sub-100-ns time resolution

Natl Sci Rev. 2023 May 9;11(4):nwad134. doi: 10.1093/nsr/nwad134. eCollection 2024 Apr.

Authors

Yangbo Zhang^{1

2}, Wenda Fan^{1

2}, Jiliang Yang^{1

2}, Hao Guan^{1

2

3}, Qi Zhang^{1

2}, Xi Qin^{1

2

3}, Changkui Duan^{1

2}, Gabriele G de Boo⁴, Brett C Johnson^{5

6}, Jeffrey C McCallum⁶, Matthew J Sellars⁷, Sven Rogge⁴, Chunming Yin^{1

2

3}, Jiangfeng Du^{1

2

3}

Affiliations

¹ CAS Key Laboratory of Microscale Magnetic Resonance and School of Physical Sciences, University of Science and Technology of China, Hefei 230026, China.
² CAS Center for Excellence in Quantum Information and Quantum Physics, University of Science and Technology of China, Hefei 230026, China.
³ Hefei National Laboratory, University of Science and Technology of China, Hefei 230088, China.
⁴ Centre of Excellence for Quantum Computation and Communication Technology, School of Physics, University of New South Wales, NSW 2052, Australia.
⁵ Centre of Excellence for Quantum Computation and Communication Technology, School of Engineering, RMIT University, Victoria 3001, Australia.
⁶ Centre of Excellence for Quantum Computation and Communication Technology, School of Physics, University of Melbourne, Victoria 3010, Australia.
⁷ Centre of Excellence for Quantum Computation and Communication Technology, Research School of Physics and Engineering, Australian National University, ACT 0200, Australia.

Abstract

Efficient detection of single optical centres in solids is essential for quantum information processing, sensing and single-photon generation applications. In this work, we use radio-frequency (RF) reflectometry to electrically detect the photoionisation induced by a single Er³⁺ ion in Si. The high bandwidth and sensitivity of the RF reflectometry provide sub-100-ns time resolution for the photoionisation detection. With this technique, the optically excited state lifetime of a single Er³⁺ ion in a Si nano-transistor is measured for the first time to be [Formula: see text]s. Our results demonstrate an efficient approach for detecting a charge state change induced by Er excitation and relaxation. This approach could be used for fast readout of other single optical centres in solids and is attractive for large-scale integrated optical quantum systems thanks to the multi-channel RF reflectometry demonstrated with frequency multiplexing techniques.

Keywords: RF reflectometry; erbium ions; photoionisation detection; single optical centres.