Scanning Nanospin Ensemble Microscope for Nanoscale Magnetic and Thermal Imaging

Quantum sensors based on solid-state spins provide tremendous opportunities in a wide range of fields from basic physics and chemistry to biomedical imaging. However, integrating them into a scanning probe microscope to enable practical, nanoscale quantum imaging is a highly challenging task. Recently, the use of single spins in diamond in conjunction with atomic force microscopy techniques has allowed significant progress toward this goal, but generalization of this approach has so far been impeded by long acquisition times or by the absence of simultaneous topographic information. Here, we report on a scanning quantum probe microscope which solves both issues by employing a nanospin ensemble hosted in a nanodiamond. This approach provides up to an order of magnitude gain in acquisition time while preserving sub-100 nm spatial resolution both for the quantum sensor and topographic images. We demonstrate two applications of this microscope. We first image nanoscale clusters of maghemite particles through both spin resonance spectroscopy and spin relaxometry, under ambient conditions. Our images reveal fast magnetic field fluctuations in addition to a static component, indicating the presence of both superparamagnetic and ferromagnetic particles. We next demonstrate a new imaging modality where the nanospin ensemble is used as a thermometer. We use this technique to map the photoinduced heating generated by laser irradiation of a single gold nanoparticle in a fluid environment. This work paves the way toward new applications of quantum probe microscopy such as thermal/magnetic imaging of operating microelectronic devices and magnetic detection of ion channels in cell membranes.