Fig. 3
From: Ab initio description of highly correlated states in defects for realizing quantum bits
Potential energy surfaces of the lowest lying multiplet states of the centers as obtained in the adiabatic approximation. a NV− and b VCVSi hh vs. the displacement Q along the linear path connecting the ground and Jahn–Teller distorted excited state geometries (GS and ES2 repectively, QGS = 0). In c, d a schematic comparison of the optical excitation and spin relaxation paths (solid and dashed red arrows) of NV− and VCVSi for the lowest states including non-radiative relaxation (blue arrow) is shown
