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arXiv · 1602.01079

Design of defect spins in piezoelectric aluminum nitride for solid-state hybrid quantum technologies

Hosung Seo·Marco Govoni·Giulia Galli
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Abstract

Spin defects in wide-band gap semiconductors are promising systems for the realization of quantum bits, or qubits, in solid-state environments. To date, defect qubits have only been realized in materials with strong covalent bonds. Here, we introduce a strain-driven scheme to rationally design defect spins in functional ionic crystals, which may operate as potential qubits. In particular, using a combination of state-of-the-art ab-initio calculations based on hybrid density functional and many-body perturbation theory, we predicted that the negatively charged nitrogen vacancy center in piezoelectric aluminum nitride exhibits spin-triplet ground states under realistic uni- and bi-axial strain conditions; such states may be harnessed for the realization of qubits. The strain-driven strategy adopted here can be readily extended to a wide range of point defects in other wide-band gap semiconductors, paving the way to controlling the spin properties of defects in ionic systems for potential spintronic technologies.

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Hosung Seo, Marco Govoni, Giulia Galli. 2016-02-02. Design of defect spins in piezoelectric aluminum nitride for solid-state hybrid quantum technologies. https://arxiv.org/abs/1602.01079

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