Abstract
Chemical defects that fluoresce in the shortwave infrared open exciting opportunities in deep-penetration bioimaging, chemically specific sensing, and quantum technologies. However, the atomic size of defects and the high noise of infrared detectors have posed significant challenges to the studies of these unique emitters. Here we demonstrate high throughput single-defect spectroscopy in the shortwave infrared capable of quantitatively and spectrally resolving chemical defects at the single defect level. By cooling an InGaAs detector array down to −190 °C and implementing a nondestructive readout scheme, we are able to capture low light fluorescent events in the shortwave infrared with a signal-to-noise ratio improved by more than three orders-of-magnitude. As a demonstration, we show it is possible to resolve individual chemical defects in carbon nanotube semiconductors, simultaneously collecting a full spectrum for each defect within the entire field of view at the single defect limit.
Highlights
Chemical defects that fluoresce in the shortwave infrared open exciting opportunities in deep-penetration bioimaging, chemically specific sensing, and quantum technologies
Spectroscopic studies of individual color centers in the visible range have been reported[19,20], single-defect spectroscopy in the shortwave IR is challenging due to the diffraction limit, which is approximately half of the wavelength of the emitted light, and indium gallium arsenide (InGaAs) detectors, which are noisy for low-light measurements[21,22]
We show that nondestructive readout and cooling the InGaAs detector array to −190 °C collectively improve the signal-to-noise ratio by more than three orders-of-magnitude
Summary
Chemical defects that fluoresce in the shortwave infrared open exciting opportunities in deep-penetration bioimaging, chemically specific sensing, and quantum technologies. We show it is possible to perform high throughput singledefect spectroscopy in the shortwave IR to spectrally identify and quantitatively count chemical defects at the single-defect level.
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