Entanglement asymmetry dynamics in random quantum circuits

TL;DR

This paper investigates how entanglement asymmetry evolves in random quantum circuits with a focus on local $U(1)$ charge, revealing different equilibration behaviors depending on subsystem size and circuit locality.

Contribution

It provides a detailed analysis of entanglement asymmetry dynamics in both local and non-local random circuits, highlighting size-dependent equilibration times and the role of scrambling.

Findings

Entanglement asymmetry approaches stationarity independently of system size.

Subsystem size determines whether entanglement asymmetry grows monotonically or non-monotonically.

Subsystem equilibration times scale linearly or logarithmically with system size depending on circuit locality.

Abstract

We study the dynamics of entanglement asymmetry in random unitary circuits (RUCs). Focusing on a local $U(1)$ charge, we consider symmetric initial states evolved by both local one-dimensional circuits and geometrically non-local RUCs made of two-qudit gates. We compute the entanglement asymmetry of subsystems of arbitrary size, analyzing the relaxation time scales. We show that the entanglement asymmetry of the whole system approaches its stationary value in a time independent of the system size for both local and non-local circuits. For subsystems, we find qualitative differences depending on their size. When the subsystem is larger than half of the full system, the equilibration time scales are again independent of the system size for both local and non-local circuits and the entanglement asymmetry grows monotonically in time. Conversely, when the subsystems are smaller than half of the full system, we show that the entanglement asymmetry is non-monotonic in time and that it equilibrates in a time proportional to the quantum-information scrambling time, providing a physical intuition. As a consequence, the subsystem-equilibration time depends on the locality of interactions, scaling linearly and logarithmically in the system size, respectively, for local and non-local RUCs. Our work confirms the entanglement asymmetry as a versatile and computable probe of symmetry in many-body physics and yields a phenomenological overview of entanglement-asymmetry evolution in typical non-integrable dynamics.