Telecom-Luminescent and Room Temperature Coherent Tetrathiafulvalene-Based Qubits in Spin-Rich Solids

One of the main challenges facing quantum information science (QIS) is the development of robust qubits that can be operated under ambient conditions. Current state-of-the-art anionic nitrogen-vacancy center (NV^-) defect qubits are robust enough to be operated at room temperature but lack scalability and tunability. These are areas where molecular qubits excel, although, in contrast, they typically suffer from poor air stability and fast decoherence at elevated temperatures and in magnetically noisy environments. Organic-based systems offer possible advantages to this end, although examples retaining room temperature coherence are still rare. Furthermore, most organic-based systems lack optical transitions similar to NV^- centers that could allow for optical initialization and readout. Here we report two new organic-based qubit candidates that demonstrate room temperature coherence in nuclear and electron spin-rich environments. These qubits luminesce far into the near-infrared (NIR, 700-1700 nm) and telecom (∼1260-1625 nm) regions, ideal for biological sensing and communications applications, respectively.