SAXException2: A cycle is detected in the object graph. What is the case?

Question

I have a web-service with Java class files that have been generated with NetBeans based on the database schema I have.

I get strange exceptions sometimes and one of them is this one:

javax.xml.ws.WebServiceException: javax.xml.bind.MarshalException
 - with linked exception:
[com.sun.istack.internal.SAXException2: A cycle is detected in the object graph. This will cause infinitely deep XML: org.mylib.Person[ personId=1 ] ->org.mylib.TeamPerson[ teamPersonPK=org.mylib.teamPersonPK[ teamId=1, personId=1 ] ] -> org.mylib.Person[ personId=1 ]]

I have googled this exception and found some simillar cases but I still cannot understand the problem. I have just generated those classes (Person.java, Team.java, TeamPerson.java) with NetBeans so how can the problem occur?

This happens when I try to get all Persons:

Iterator iter = team.getTeamPersonCollection().iterator();
while(iter.hasNext()) {
            Person person = ((TeamPerson)iter.next()).getPerson();
...
}

EDIT
If I remove the Team reference from TeamPerson I get the following error:

Internal Exception: Exception [EclipseLink-7154] (Eclipse Persistence Services - 2.2.0.v20110202-r8913): org.eclipse.persistence.exceptions.ValidationException
Exception Description: The attribute [teamPersonCollection] in entity class [class org.mylib.Team] has a mappedBy value of [team] which does not exist in its owning entity class [org.mylib.TeamPerson]. If the owning entity class is a @MappedSuperclass, this is invalid, and your attribute should reference the correct subclass.
    at org.eclipse.persistence.exceptions.PersistenceUnitLoadingException.exceptionSearchingForPersistenceResources(PersistenceUnitLoadingException.java:126)

EDIT 2
Parts of the generated classes looks like this:

Team.java

public class Team implements Serializable {
    private static final long serialVersionUID = 1L;
    @Id
    @Basic(optional = false)
    @Column(name = "team_id")
    private Integer teamId;
    @Column(name = "type")
    private String type;
    @OneToMany(cascade = CascadeType.ALL, mappedBy = "team")
    private Collection<TeamPerson> teamPersonCollection;

Person.java

public class Person implements Serializable {
    private static final long serialVersionUID = 1L;
    @Id
    @Basic(optional = false)
    @Column(name = "person_id")
    private Integer personId;
    @Column(name = "name")
    private String name;
    @OneToMany(cascade = CascadeType.ALL, mappedBy = "person")
    private Collection<TeamPerson> teamPersonCollection;

TeamPerson.java

public class TeamPerson implements Serializable {
    private static final long serialVersionUID = 1L;
    @EmbeddedId
    protected TeamPersonPK teamPersonPK;
    @Basic(optional = false)
    @Column(name = "timestamp")
    @Temporal(TemporalType.TIMESTAMP)
    private Date timestamp;
    @JoinColumn(name = "team_id", referencedColumnName = "team_id", insertable = false, updatable = false)
    @ManyToOne(optional = false)
    private Team team;
    @JoinColumn(name = "person_id", referencedColumnName = "person_id", insertable = false, updatable = false)
    @ManyToOne(optional = false)
    private Person person;

TeamPersonPK.java

@Embeddable
public class TeamPersonPK implements Serializable {
    @Basic(optional = false)
    @Column(name = "team_id")
    private int teamId;
    @Basic(optional = false)
    @Column(name = "person_id")
    private int personId;

Answer 1

The solution is simply to add the annotation : "@XmlTransient" (javax.xml.bind.annotation.XmlTransient) at the getter of the property that causes the cycle.