• Accepted Paper

Magneto-optical properties of the neutral silicon-vacancy center in diamond under extreme isotropic strain fields

Meysam Mohseni, Gergő Thiering, and Adam Gali

Phys. Rev. Applied - Accepted 2 November, 2026

DOI: https://doi.org/10.1103/yd2g-3nx3

Abstract

The neutral silicon–vacancy (SiV0) center in diamond combines inversion symmetry with optical emission, making it a robust quantum emitter resilient to stray electric fields. Using first-principles density-functional theory, we quantify its response to isotropic strain spanning strong compression and tensile regimes (effective hydrostatic pressures of approximately −80 to 180~GPa). The coexistence of doubly degenerate eg and eu levels produces a structural instability captured by a quadratic product Jahn–Teller model. Under isotropic compression, the zero-phonon line blue-shifts nearly linearly while the Eg phonon stiffens, suppressing vibronic instabilities and reducing Jahn–Teller quenching. Consequently, the Ham-reduced excited-state spin–orbit splitting increases substantially and the dark–bright vibronic gap widens. In contrast, isotropic tensile strain enhances vibronic effects and induces symmetry breaking beyond a critical strain, with tunneling-mediated dynamical averaging at the onset. Throughout the symmetry-preserving regime, parity remains well defined, so isotropic strain alone does not activate the dark transition. Charge-transition levels indicate photostability of the emission deep into the compressive regime, and near the highest photostable deformation (∼100~GPa), the radiative lifetime increases due to a reduced transition dipole moment despite the increasing optical energy. These trends yield compact calibration relations linking optical and spin observables to isotropic strain and establish SiV0 as a symmetry-protected, strain-tunable quantum emitter operating into the multi-megabar-equivalent regime.

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