Nanometer-scale probing of spin waves using single electron spins

We have developed a new approach to exploring magnetic excitations in correlated-electron systems [1], based on single electronic spins in atom-like defects diamond known as nitrogen-vacancy (NV) color centers. We demonstrate the power of this approach by detecting spin-wave excitations in a ferromagnetic microdisc with nanoscale spatial sensitivity over a broad range of frequencies and magnetic fields. We show how spin-wave resonances can be exploited for on-chip amplification of microwave magnetic fields, allowing strongly increased spin manipulation rates and single-spin magnetometry with enhanced sensitivity. Finally, we show the possibility to detect the magnetic spin noise produced by a thin ($\sim$ 30 nm) layer of a patterned ferromagnet. For the interpretation of our results, we develop a general framework describing single-spin stray field detection in terms of a filter function sensitive mostly to spin fluctuations with wavevector $\sim 1/d$, where $d$ is the NV-ferromagnet distance. Our results pave the way towards quantitative and non-perturbative detection of spectral properties in nanomagnets, establishing NV center magnetometry as an emergent probe of collective spin dynamics in condensed matter.\\[4pt] [1] arXiv:1410.6423v2 (2014).