INTERFEROMETRY AS A BINARY DECISION PROBLEM

Binary decision theory has been applied to the general interferometric problem. An optimal detection scheme - according to the Neyman-Pearso n criterion - has been considered for different phase-enhanced states of the radiation field, and the corresponding bounds on the minimum de tectable phase shift have been evaluated. A general bound on interfero metric precision has been also obtained in terms of photon number fluc tuations of the signal mode carrying the phase information.