Interplay between geometric and dynamic phases in a single-spin system

Abstract

We use a combination of microwave fields and free precession to drive the spin of a nitrogen-vacancy (NV) center in diamond on different trajectories on the Bloch sphere and investigate the physical significance of the frame-dependent decomposition of the total phase into geometric and dynamic parts. The experiments are performed on a two-level subspace of the spin-1 ground state of the NV, where the Aharonov-Anandan geometric phase manifests itself as a global phase, and we use the third level of the NV ground-state triplet to detect it. We show that while the geometric Aharonov-Anandan phase retains its connection to the solid angle swept out by the evolving spin, it is generally accompani..