Observing the rotational diffusion of nanodiamonds with arbitrary nitrogen vacancy center configurations.

We present theoretical results on the relationship between the rotational diffusion coefficient of a nanodiamond undergoing Brownian motion and the configuration of nitrogen vacancy centers (NVCs) contained in the particle. Through exact calculations and simulations, we obtain the fluorescence intensity autocorrelation function that is measured in optically detected magnetic resonance experiments conducted at single-particle level. We relate the autocorrelation function to the rotational diffusion coefficient and discuss the influence of different NVC configurations on the outcome of measurements. We believe that our results can be useful in interpreting observations on nanodiamonds that contain multiple nitrogen vacancy centers. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]