Necessary and sufficient condition for contextuality from incompatibility

Abstract

Measurement incompatibility is the most basic resource that distinguishes quantum from classical physics. Contextuality is the critical resource behind the power of some models of quantum computation and is also a necessary ingredient for many applications in quantum information. A fundamental problem is thus identifying when incompatibility produces contextuality. Here, we show that, given a structure of incompatibility characterized by a graph in which nonadjacent vertices represent incompatible ideal measurements, the necessary and sufficient condition for the existence of a quantum realization producing contextuality is that this graph contains induced cycles of size larger than three.