Necessary and sufficient classicality conditions on photon number distributions

Abstract

We exploit results on the classical Stieltjes moment problem to obtain completely explicit necessary and sufficient conditions for the photon number distribution p(n) of a radiation field mode to be classical. These conditions are given in two forms - respectively local and global in the individual photon number probabilities. Central to the first approach is the recognition of the important fact that the quantities n!p(n) are moments of a quasiprobability distribution, notwithstanding the fact that p(n)'s can by themselves be considered as a probability distribution over the nonnegative integers. This leads to local classicality conditions involving p(n)'s for only a small number of values of n. This local approach enables us to present detailed quantitative statements on the connection between nonclassicality and oscillations in the photon number distribution. The second approach is in terms of the traditional factorial moments of p(n). Equivalence of the two approaches is established.