Tests of Gaussianity of CMB maps

We study two different methods to test Gaussianity in CMB maps. One of them is based on the partition function and the other on the morphology of hot and cold spots. The partition function contains information on all the moments and scales, being a useful quantity to compress the large data sets expected from future space missions like Planck. In particular, it contains much richer information than the one available through the radiation power spectrum. The second method utilizes morphological properties of hot and cold spots such as the eccentricity and number of spots in CMB maps. We study the performance of both methods in detecting non-Gaussian features in small scale CMB simulated maps…