Charged boron vacancies (VB−) in hexagonal boron nitride (hBN) have emerged as a promising platform for quantum nanoscale sensing and imaging. While these primarily involve electron spins, nuclear spins provide an additional resource for quantum operations. This work presents a comprehensive experimental and theoretical study of the properties and coherent control of the nearest-neighbor 15N nuclear spins of VB−-ensembles in isotope-enriched h10B15N. Multi-nuclear spin states are selectively addressed, enabled by state-specific nuclear spin transitions arising from spin-state mixing. We perform Rabi driving between selected state pairs, define elementary quantum gates, and measure longer than 10~μs nuclear Rabi coherence times. We observe a two orders of magnitude nuclear g-factor enhancement that underpins fast nuclear spin gates. Accompanying numerical simulations provide a deep insight into the underlying mechanisms. These results establish the foundations for leveraging nuclear spins in VB− center-based quantum applications, particularly for extending coherence times and enhancing the sensitivity of 2D quantum sensing foils.
@article{arxiv.2509.22257,
title = {Coherent control of nitrogen nuclear spins via the V$_B^-$-center in hexagonal boron nitride},
author = {Adalbert Tibiássy and Charlie J. Patrickson and Thomas Poirier and James H. Edgar and Bruno Lopez-Rodriguez and Viktor Ivády and Isaac J. Luxmoore},
journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:2509.22257},
year = {2025}
}