Coherent information quantifies the transmittable quantum information through a channel and is directly linked to the channel's quantum capacity. In a monitored quantum circuit, regarded as a quantum channel, extensive and positive coherent information is sustained at low measurement rates, protected by the scrambling dynamics. However, noise suppresses coherent information, driving it to zero or negative values. Here, we show that incorporating quantum-enhanced operations facilitates reliable quantum information transmission even in the presence of noise, as evidenced by a phase transition in coherent information from a recoverable phase with positive values to an irrecoverable phase with negative values. We provide both analytical understanding and numerical evidence demonstrating this transition, which is modulated by the relative frequencies of noise and quantum-enhanced operations. Additionally, we propose a resource-efficient protocol to characterize this phase transition in experiments, effectively avoiding postselection by utilizing every run of the quantum circuit. This approach bridges the gap between theoretical insights and practical implementation, making the phase transition feasible to demonstrate on realistic noisy intermediate-scale quantum devices.
Coherent information quantifies the transmittable quantum information through a channel and is directly linked to the channel's quantum capacity. In a monitored quantum circuit, regarded as a quantum channel, extensive and positive coherent information is sustained at low measurement rates, protected by the scrambling dynamics. However, noise suppresses coherent information, driving it to zero or negative values. Here, we show that incorporating quantum-enhanced operations facilitates reliable quantum information transmission even in the presence of noise, as evidenced by a phase transition in coherent information from a recoverable phase with positive values to an irrecoverable phase with negative values. We provide both analytical understanding and numerical evidence demonstrating this transition, which is modulated by the relative frequencies of noise and quantum-enhanced operations. Additionally, we propose a resource-efficient protocol to characterize this phase transition in experiments, effectively avoiding postselection by utilizing every run of the quantum circuit. This approach bridges the gap between theoretical insights and practical implementation, making the phase transition feasible to demonstrate on realistic noisy intermediate-scale quantum devices.
Abstract Monitored quantum circuits offer great perspectives for exploring the interplay of quantum information and complex quantum dynamics. These systems exhibit entanglement and purification phase transitions, along with various symmetry-enforced and ordered non-equilibrium phases. The central question is whether these phases can persist in real-world noisy devices. We study the fate of the symmetry-enforced absorbing state and charge-sharpening transitions in the presence of noise, and establish that noise results in coherent and incoherent symmetry-breaking effects. The coherent effects blur the distinction between phases, turning sharp transitions into crossovers, but states far from phase boundaries largely retain their essential character. We find, corrective feedback and postselected measurements can mitigate noise, stabilizing the absorbing and charge-sharp phases. Hence, if challenges like postselection are addressed, errors do not prevent the observation of symmetry-enforced phases in noisy intermediate-scale quantum (NISQ) devices. Additionally, we propose a symmetry-based method to characterize noise and gate fidelity.
Noisy monitored quantum circuits have emerged as a versatile and unifying framework connecting quantum many-body physics, quantum information, and quantum computation. In this review, we provide a comprehensive overview of recent advances in understanding the dynamics of such circuits, with an emphasis on their entanglement structure, information-protection capabilities, and noise-induced phase transitions. A central theme is the mapping to classical statistical models, which reveals how quantum noise reshapes dominant spin configurations. This framework elucidates universal scaling behaviors, including the characteristic q−1/3 entanglement scaling with noise probability q and distinct timescales for information protection. We further highlight a broad range of constructions and applications inspired by noisy monitored circuits, spanning variational quantum algorithms, classical simulation methods, mixed-state phases of matter, and emerging approaches to quantum error mitigation and quantum error correction. These developments collectively establish noisy monitored circuits as a powerful platform for probing and controlling quantum dynamics in realistic, decohering environments.
Random unitaries scramble quantum information into highly nonlocal degrees of freedom, thereby providing protection from local noise. However, as demonstrated by Turkeshi and Sierant (Phys. Rev. Lett. 132, 140401, 2024 and arXiv:2603.00235), this protection may fail once local noise grows sufficiently strong. These works describe a phase transition in a noisy random encoding-decoding circuit model between an error-protecting phase, in which encoded information is recoverable, and an error-vulnerable phase, in which encoded information is lost, with the transition occurring at a critical coherent noise angle αc≈1.14. Here, we present the first experimental observation of this transition, conducted on IBM's ibm_pittsburgh Heron r3 device for system sizes of up to N=26 qubits. We detect this transition via three order parameters: fidelity, Rényi-2 entanglement entropy, and stabilizer Rényi-2 entropy. For the latter two, we employ randomized measurement protocols to construct estimators, and for all three, we rely on zero-noise extrapolation and M3 SPAM error mitigation. We then jointly model the finite-size scaling collapse across all three order parameters with a Gaussian process regression, yielding a critical angle αc≈1.01, well below the theoretical value. Inputting noiseless simulated data into the same model yields αc≈1.05, implying that the discrepancy between experiment and theory is due to our encoding circuits, which are not deep enough to be truly Haar-random. Finally, we observe that the same model cannot adequately identify critical behavior in unmitigated, raw experimental data. This indicates that error mitigation techniques are crucial for detecting the transition on hardware.
Scrambling dynamics induced by random unitary gates can protect information from low-rate measurements, which underpins the phenomenon known as the measurement-induced phase transition (MIPT). However, typical decoherence noise disrupts the volume-law phase, complicating the observation of the MIPT on noisy intermediate-scale quantum devices. Here, we demonstrate that incorporating quantum-enhanced operations can effectively protect the MIPT from environmental noise, thereby enabling its detection in experiment. The transition is characterized by conditional entanglement entropy, which is associated with a statistical mechanics model wherein noise and quantum-enhanced operations act as competing external random fields. When the net external field is zero, a ferromagnetic-paramagnetic phase transition is expected, resulting in the MIPT. This zero-field condition also ensures an average apparatus-environment symmetry, making conditional entanglement entropy a valid probe of entanglement and establishing the transition as a genuine entanglement phase transition. Additionally, we provide numerical results that demonstrate the MIPT in a (2+1)-dimensional quantum circuit under dephasing noise. We also propose a method to estimate the noise rate, enabling the zero-field condition to be achieved experimentally and ensuring the feasibility of our protocol. Our result serves as a concrete example of the power of quantum enhancement in combating noise.
The presence of quantum noises inherent to real physical systems can strongly impact the physics in hybrid quantum circuits with local random unitaries and midcircuit measurements. The quantum noises with a size-independent occurring probability can lead to the disappearance of a measurement-induced entanglement phase transition and the emergence of a single area-law phase. In this work, we investigate the effects of quantum noises with size-dependent probabilities $q=p/{L}^{\ensuremath{\alpha}}$, where $\ensuremath{\alpha}$ represents the scaling exponent. We have identified a noise-induced entanglement phase transition from a volume law to a power (area) law in the presence (absence) of measurements as p increases when $\ensuremath{\alpha}=1$. With the help of an effective statistical model, we reveal that the phase transition is of first order arising from the competition between two types of spin configurations and shares the same analytical understanding as the noise-induced coding transition. This unified picture further deepens the understanding of the connection between entanglement behavior and the capacity of information protection. When $\ensuremath{\alpha}\ensuremath{\ne}1$, one spin configuration always dominates regardless of p and thus the phase transition disappears. Moreover, we highlight the difference between the effects of size-dependent bulk noise and boundary noises. We validate our analytical predictions with extensive numerical results from stabilizer circuit simulations.
We study error correction type protocols in which a quantum channel encodes logical information into an enlarged Hilbert space. Specifically, we consider channels realized by one dimensional random noisy quantum circuits with spatially local interaction gates. We analyze both noise acting after the encoding and noise affecting the encoding circuit itself. Using the coherent information as a metric, we show that in both cases the infinite depth limit is governed by random matrix theory, which predicts a universal phase transition at a critical noise rate. This critical point separates an error correcting phase, in which encoded information is preserved, from a phase in which it is irretrievably lost. Going beyond the infinite depth limit, we characterize the systematic finite depth deviations from random matrix universality. In particular, we show that these deviations behave parametrically differently depending on whether the noise acts after the encoding or also affects the encoding itself. For noiseless encoders, the approach is exponential in circuit depth, although boundary effects can delay perfect encoding relative to the circuit design time. For noisy encoders, we find that the circuit fidelity effectively replaces the Hashing bound, and perfect encoding is approached polynomially with depth.