We use nitrogen-vacancy (NV) centers in diamond to produce pictures based on the magnetic fields created by eddy-currents [1]. Such an approach enables to discriminate different materials according to their conductivity. Our device has a bandwidth of 3.5 MHz and a spatial resolution of 0.3 mm. Then, we use NV centers as the magnetic field […]
Mirrorless lasing in sodium, rubidium, and cesium vapors
In contrast to a common “conventional wisdom” not all lasers have two or more mirrors that make up a laser resonator (a.k.a. laser cavity). In fact, if the gain in the active medium is sufficiently high, only one mirror or even no mirrors at all are required for lasing to occur. The latter case corresponds […]
Single-spin NMR concept proposed
After reviewing briefly the concept of zero magnetic field nuclear magnetic resonance (ZULF NMR), Dmitry Budker describes a recent proposal to use single NV center sensors to measure single nuclear spins in ZULF NMR [1]. References: Extreme nuclear magnetic resonance: zero field, single spins, dark matter…, Dmitry Budker, arXiv:1905.08851 (2019).
Probing superconductivity with diamonds
Diamonds may contain color centers, such as the nitrogen-vacancy centers. With collaborators all over the world, we review the current state of affairs in using such centers to explore the behavior of materials in their superconducting regime [1]. In particular, nitrogen-vacancy centers allow us to perform: * vector magnetometry at a wide range of temperatures […]
Nitrogen-vacancy centers’ hyperfine transitions observed when the related energy levels cross each other
Nitrogen-vacancy (NV) centers are probed all around the world on a daily basis. Here, in collaboration with a group of researches in the University of Latvia, we probe them as well, but first we turn on a magnetic field around them. Not any magnetic field, but such a field at which the hyperfine energy levels […]
Advances Engineering magazine reports our gradiometer work
https://journals.aps.org/prapplied/abstract/10.1103/PhysRevApplied.11.024005 https://arxiv.org/abs/1808.02743
Isotopic variation of parity violation in atomic ytterbium
By observing the weak force’s effect in atomic ytterbium, and its dependence on isotopes of ytterbium, we find the prediction of Standard model to triumph once again. Nature physics ArXiv Press release Figure 3a in the article shows the magnitude of weak force effect (parity violation) in atomic ytterbium, as a function of ytterbium’s isotope. Standard model predicts […]
Dr. Derek Kimball is selected Fellow of the American Physical Society
Dr. Derek Kimball, HIM Visiting Scientist, the Scientific Coordinator of CAPER and GNOME, and a good friend, was selected Fellow of the American Physical Society.
A liquid of identical molecules as first-of-its-kind comagnetometer
Researchers from the Helmholtz Institute Mainz built a comagnetometer based on an ensemble of identical molecules. Thus the problem is: you need two magnetic field measurements to look for tiny effects, but when you use two different molecules to interact with the magnetic fields, the molecules tend to end up in different places (at least […]
Our Postdoc receives the 2018 Bragg Gold Medal
Yevgeny Stadnik, a Humboldt Fellow in our group, earns the Australian Institute of Physics’ 2018 Bragg Gold Medal for his PhD thesis [1,2], “Manifestations of Dark Matter and Variations of the Fundamental Constants of Nature in Atoms and Astrophysical Phenomena”. Caption: Yevgeny Stadnik in color.