No quantum realization of extremal no-signaling boxes

TL;DR

This paper proves that extremal no-signaling boxes cannot be realized within quantum theory, impacting device-independent protocols, information-theoretic principles, and non-local game strategies.

Contribution

It establishes a fundamental no-go result for realizing extremal no-signaling boxes in quantum theory, with implications for quantum information and non-locality.

Findings

Extremal no-signaling boxes are not realizable in quantum theory.

Implications for device-independent randomness and security protocols.

Identification of non-local games with no quantum winning strategy.

Abstract

Pure states are very important in any theory since they represent states of maximal information about the system within the theory. Here, we show that no non-trivial (not local realistic) extremal states (boxes) of general no-signaling theories can be realized within quantum theory. We then explore three interesting consequences of this fact. Firstly, since the pure states are uncorrelated from the environment, the statement forms a no-go result against the most straightforward device-independent protocol for randomness or secure key generation against general no-signaling adversaries. It also leads to the interesting question whether all non-extremal boxes allow for non-local correlations with the adversary. Secondly, in addition to the fact that new information-theoretic principles (designed to pick out the set of quantum correlations from among all non signaling ones) can in consequence be tested on arbitrary non-local vertices to check their validity, it also allows the possibility of excluding from the quantum set any box of no-signaling correlations that can be distilled to a non-local vertex. Finally, it also forms a sufficient condition to identify non-local games with no quantum winning strategy, when one can show that the game has a single unique non-signaling winning strategy. We illustrate each of these consequences with the example of generalized Popescu-Rohrlich boxes.