Enhanced quantum phase estimation with q-deformed nonideal nonclassical light

Abstract q-deformed photon states arise from generalized oscillator algebras in which the standard bosonic commutation relations are modified by a deformation parameter q. They effectively model realistic nonideal photon statistics, including deviations such as sub- and super-Poissonian distributions. We investigate quantum phase estimation in a Mach–Zehnder interferometer using q-deformed photon states, including q-coherent and q-cat states, which model realistic deviations from ideal light sources. By deriving closed-form photon count likelihoods via the Jordan–Schwinger mapping, we compute the quantum and classical Fisher information and perform Bayesian inference on simulated detector data. Our results show that photon counting remains an optimal measurement strategy even for deformed states, with classical and quantum Fisher information in exact agreement. Furthermore, the phase sensitivity improves with increasing q-deformation, indicating enhanced metrological performance driven by nonclassical photon statistics. These findings highlight the utility of q-deformed states in quantum sensing.