Measures of non-Gaussianity for one-mode field states

Abstract

We introduce and investigate a distance-type measure of non-Gaussianity based on the quantum fidelity. This new measure can readily be evaluated for all pure states and mixed states that are diagonal in the Fock basis. In particular, for an $M$-photon added thermal state, an analysis of the Bures degree of non-Gaussianity is made in comparison with two previous measures built with the Hilbert-Schmidt metric and the relative entropy. We obtain a compact analytic formula for the Hilbert-Schmidt non-Gaussianity measure and find a good consistency of the three examined measures.