Enhanced coherence of rare-earth nuclear spins in a crystal

Rare-earth ions in crystals are useful in precision measurements and quantum information science because of their exceptional optical and spin coherence properties. We show that the nuclear spin coherence time of ¹⁵³Eu³⁺ ions doped into yttrium orthosilicate can be significantly enhanced by driving the ⁸⁹Y nuclear spins in the host crystal. This improvement in spin coherence time opens up ways to improve the precision of measurements using rare-earth-doped crystals.