Apparatus and method for recovery of three dimensional magnetic field from a magnetic detection system

A system for magnetic detection of an external magnetic field is disclosed. The system includes a nitrogen vacancy (NV) diamond material comprising a plurality of NV centers, a magnetic field generator that generates a magnetic field, a radio frequency (RF) excitation source that provides RF excitation, an optical excitation source that provides optical excitation, an optical detector that receives an optical signal emitted by the NV diamond material, and a controller. The controller is configured to calculate a control magnetic field, control the magnetic field generator to generate the control magnetic field, receive a light detection signal from the optical detector based on the optical signal due to the sum of the generated control magnetic field and the external magnetic field, store measurement data based on the received light detection signal, and calculate a vector of the external magnetic field based on the stored measurement data.