Addressable electron spin resonance using donors and donor molecules in silicon

Abstract

Phosphorus donor impurities in silicon are a promising candidate for solid-state quantum computing due to their exceptionally long coherence times and high fidelities. However, individual addressability of exchange coupled donors with separations ~15 nm is challenging. We show that by using atomic precision lithography, we can place a single P donor next to a 2P molecule 16 ± 1 nm apart and use their distinctive hyperfine coupling strengths to address qubits at vastly different resonance frequencies. In particular, the single donor yields two hyperfine peaks separated by 97 ± 2.5 MHz, in contrast to the donor molecule that exhibits three peaks separated by 262 ± 10 MHz. Atomistic tight-binding simulations confirm the large hyperfine interaction strength in the 2P molecule with an interdonor separation of ~0.7 nm, consistent with lithographic scanning tunneling microscopy images of the 2P site during device fabrication. We discuss the viability of using donor molecules for built-in addressability of electron spin qubits in silicon.