Coupling of single nanodiamonds hosting SiV color centers to plasmonic double bowtie microantennas

Nanotechnology. 2025 Jan 14. doi: 10.1088/1361-6528/ada9a4. Online ahead of print.

Abstract

Color centers are promising single-photon emitters owing to their operation at room temperature and high photostability. In particular, using nanodiamonds as a host material is of interest for sensing and metrology. Furthermore, being a solid-state system allows for incorporation to photonic systems to tune both the emission intensity and photoluminescence spectrum and therefore adapt the individual color center to desired properties. We show successful coupling of a single nanodiamond hosting silicon-vacancy color centers to a plasmonic double bowtie antenna structure. To predict the spectrum of the coupled system, the photoluminescence spectrum of the SiV centers was measured before the coupling process and convoluted with the antenna resonance spectrum. After transferring the nanodiamond to the antenna the combined spectrum was measured again. The measurement agrees well with the calculated prediction of the coupled system and therefore confirms successful coupling.

Keywords: Pick and Place Technique; Silicon-vacancy center; color center; nanodiamond; plasmonic antenna.