Efficient single photon emission from a high-purity hexagonal boron nitride crystal Auteur(s): Martinez L. J., Pelini T., Waselowski V., Maze J. R., Gil B., Cassabois G., Jacques V. (Article) Publié: Physical Review B, vol. 94 p.121405 (2016) Texte intégral en Openaccess : Ref HAL: hal-01383967_v1 DOI: 10.1103/PhysRevB.94.121405 WoS: WOS:000383865700001 Exporter : BibTex | endNote 67 Citations Résumé: Among a variety of layered materials used as building blocks in van der Waals heterostructures, hexagonal boron nitride (hBN) appears as an ideal platform for hosting optically-active defects owing to its large bandgap ($\sim 6$~eV). Here we study the optical response of a high-purity hBN crystal under green laser illumination. By means of photon correlation measurements, we identify individual defects emitting a highly photostable fluorescence under ambient conditions. A detailed analysis of the photophysical properties reveals a high quantum efficiency of the radiative transition, leading to a single photon source with very high brightness ($\sim 4\times 10^6$ counts.s$^{-1}$). These results illustrate how the wide range of applications offered by hBN could be further extended to photonic-based quantum information science and metrology. |