Growth of High-Purity Low-Strain Fluorescent Nanodiamonds

Abstract

Fluorescent emitters in diamond have far-reaching potential applications in areas like quantum information, advanced biosensing, and materials research (especially magnetic and superconductor materials). However, many of these applications are limited by imperfections in commercially available fluorescent nanodiamonds (FNDs) due to paramagnetic impurities and crystal lattice strains. These limitations are a direct consequence of the way fluorescent nanodiamonds are produced. Here, we show that for high pressure growth, at a relatively low temperature of 400 °C, we can produce high-purity and low-strain FNDs after standard irradiation and annealing treatments. This work is a milestone toward the engineering of high-quality ultrasmall fluorescent nanodiamonds.