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Entanglement asymmetry dynamics in random quantum circuits

Filiberto Ares1,*, Sara Murciano2,3,*, Pasquale Calabrese1,4, and Lorenzo Piroli5

  • *These authors contributed equally to this work.
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Phys. Rev. Research 7, 033135 – Published 8 August, 2025

DOI: https://doi.org/10.1103/m3np-p5xj

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 nonlocal RUCs made of two-qudit gates. We compute the entanglement asymmetry of subsystems of arbitrary size, analyzing the relaxation timescales. 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 nonlocal circuits. For subsystems, we find qualitative differences depending on their size. When the subsystem is larger than half of the full system, the equilibration timescales are again independent of the system size for both local and nonlocal 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 nonmonotonic 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 nonlocal 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 nonintegrable dynamics.

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Phys. Rev. Research 7, 033135– Published 8 August, 2025
  • Received 13 February 2025
  • Accepted 10 June 2025
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