We study unitary quantum dynamics in noisy Brownian models with global continuous symmetries, such as $U(1)$ and $SU(2)$, focusing on Rényi entanglement entropies and hydrodynamic and non-hydrodynamic correlators. By mapping the averaged late-time dynamics to the low-energy physics of effective replica Hamiltonians, we find that the evolution is controlled by the quantum geometry of their ground-state manifolds, which is directly related to the geometry of $k$-commutants---the symmetry algebra of $k$ replicas of the system. In interacting systems, these $k$-commutants are generically determined solely by the symmetries of the system, independent of microscopic details of the noisy evolution. This allows us to use the time-dependent variational principle (TDVP) to provide simple geometric explanations for the sub-ballistic Rényi entanglement growth and the anomalous decay of non-hydrodynamic correlators in interacting systems with continuous symmetries. We find this behavior to be intimately connected to singularities within the $k$-commutant manifolds, arising from frozen ``void'' states in the Hilbert space that exist due to continuous on-site symmetries. This also demystifies the important role of voids in the dynamics of these observables, previously identified in $U(1)$ symmetric systems. We compare these behaviors in interacting systems with Abelian and non-Abelian continuous symmetries and in free-fermion systems, which differ in the geometry of their $k$-commutants. Ultimately, this work provides a general geometric framework for systematically studying observables in noisy systems with continuous symmetries, including Haar-random circuits.
We study unitary quantum dynamics in noisy Brownian models with global continuous symmetries, such as U(1) and SU(2), focusing on Rényi entanglement entropies and hydrodynamic and non-hydrodynamic correlators. By mapping the averaged late-time dynamics to the low-energy physics of effective replica Hamiltonians, we find that the evolution is controlled by the quantum geometry of their ground-state manifolds, which is directly related to the geometry of k-commutants---the symmetry algebra of k replicas of the system. In interacting systems, these k-commutants are generically determined solely by the symmetries of the system, independent of microscopic details of the noisy evolution. This allows us to use the time-dependent variational principle (TDVP) to provide simple geometric explanations for the sub-ballistic Rényi entanglement growth and the anomalous decay of non-hydrodynamic correlators in interacting systems with continuous symmetries. We find this behavior to be intimately connected to singularities within the k-commutant manifolds, arising from frozen ``void'' states in the Hilbert space that exist due to continuous on-site symmetries. This also demystifies the important role of voids in the dynamics of these observables, previously identified in U(1) symmetric systems. We compare these behaviors in interacting systems with Abelian and non-Abelian continuous symmetries and in free-fermion systems, which differ in the geometry of their k-commutants. Ultimately, this work provides a general geometric framework for systematically studying observables in noisy systems with continuous symmetries, including Haar-random circuits.
Quantum systems display counterintuitive features, escaping our everyday-life intuition, whose origin is related to entanglement. This phenomenon arises when different parts of the same systems display correlations, which cannot be understood via classical mechanics, and they are dubbed as quantum. To characterize the correlations above, it is necessary to find good entanglement measures which are able to capture quantitatively the quantum features of a given system. This motivates the investigation and the computation of quantities such as the von Neumann entropy of regions, which provides information about how a system is entangled. Our focus is quantum one-dimensional systems close to their critical point, where quantum correlations are enhanced, and a characterization via Quantum Field Theory (QFT) can be provided. In particular, we aim to understand the role of symmetries and localized defects on the entanglement properties. Those aspects display an intimate connection. First, via replica trick, the entropy is expressed via a replica permutation symmetry. Then, single defects break symmetries that are present in the corresponding homogeneous systems. Due to these reasons, the characterization of symmetry actions on subsystems can be viewed as a unifying framework for quantifying entanglement. We split this thesis into two parts. The first part is devoted to the symmetry-resolved entanglement. We first compute it in massive integrable field theories, giving analytical predictions for free fermions/bosons and the 3-state Potts model. For instance, we characterize the universal corrections to area law via form factor bootstrap. We also study excited states of field theories, and we characterize both low-energy states of Conformal Field Theory (CFT) and quasi-particle states. The second part deals with quantum correlations across defects. We provide a CFT framework to compute Rényi entropy and negativity in the ground state of conformal junctions, giving analytical predictions for free fermions and bosons. We find logarithmic growth of the entanglement measures above, and we relate the universal prefactor to the boundary conditions, encoded in a boundary scattering matrix. Then, we focus on the entanglement dynamics, and we study the time evolution of correlations for two paradigmatic classes of quench protocols. For a global quench, we find a linear growth of entropy across the defect whose slope is computed both in CFT, for thermal states, and for free fermions, via a modification of the quasi-particle picture. For a domain wall melting protocol, also known as inhomogeneous quench, we find that, while local observables are easily understood via hydrodynamics and local generalized Gibbs ensembles, the same is not true for the entropy. In contrast, by employing the quasi-particle picture, we provide precise predictions for the dynamics of entanglement, revealing the influence of long-range correlations between points that are specular with respect to the defect.
Symmetries shape the quantum-information dynamics of many-body systems, but their effect on nonstabilizerness, the resource complementary to entanglement, is less understood. We compute the stabilizer Rényi entropy, a measure of nonstabilizerness, in U(1)-symmetric one-dimensional random circuits. The disorder-averaged dynamics is captured by a four-replica tensor network, which we evaluate by S4-adapted infinite time-evolving block decimation (iTEBD) directly in the thermodynamic limit. Together with a hydrodynamic argument, our results identify a diffusive universality class for the late-time approach of nonstabilizerness to its random-state value, with the stabilizer Rényi entropy gap closing as 1/t. The same scaling is verified in an energy-conserving nonintegrable Ising chain. More broadly, our framework provides a hydrodynamic perspective on nonstabilizerness generation and offers insight into the design of approximate Haar-random states in Hamiltonian dynamics.
Characterizing how entanglement grows with time in a many-body system, for example, after a quantum quench, is a key problem in nonequilibrium quantum physics. We study this problem for the case of random unitary dynamics, representing either Hamiltonian evolution with time-dependent noise or evolution by a random quantum circuit. Our results reveal a universal structure behind noisy entanglement growth, and also provide simple new heuristics for the “entanglement tsunami” in Hamiltonian systems without noise. In 1D, we show that noise causes the entanglement entropy across a cut to grow according to the celebrated Kardar-Parisi-Zhang (KPZ) equation. The mean entanglement grows linearly in time, while fluctuations grow like (time)[superscript 1/3] and are spatially correlated over a distance ∝(time)[superscript 2/3]. We derive KPZ universal behavior in three complementary ways, by mapping random entanglement growth to (i) a stochastic model of a growing surface, (ii) a “minimal cut” picture, reminiscent of the Ryu-Takayanagi formula in holography, and (iii) a hydrodynamic problem involving the dynamical spreading of operators. We demonstrate KPZ universality in 1D numerically using simulations of random unitary circuits. Importantly, the leading-order time dependence of the entropy is deterministic even in the presence of noise, allowing us to propose a simple coarse grained minimal cut picture for the entanglement growth of generic Hamiltonians, even without noise, in arbitrary dimensionality. We clarify the meaning of the “velocity” of entanglement growth in the 1D entanglement tsunami. We show that in higher dimensions, noisy entanglement evolution maps to the well-studied problem of pinning of a membrane or domain wall by disorder. Subject Areas: Condensed Matter Physics, Quantum Information, Statistical Physics
This work develops tools to understand how quantum information spreads, scrambles, and is reshaped by measurements in many-body systems. First, I study scrambling and pseudorandomness in the Brownian Sachdev-Ye-Kitaev (SYK) model, quantifying pseudorandomness using unitary k-designs and frame potentials. Using Keldysh path integrals with replicas and disorder averaging, I obtain analytic control of the approach to randomness, identify collective modes that delay convergence to Haar-like behavior, and estimate design times as functions of model parameters, clarifying links between scrambling, complexity growth, and random-circuit phenomenology. Second, I construct a field theory for weakly measured SYK clusters. Starting from a system-ancilla description and a continuum monitoring limit, and using fermionic coherent states with replicas and disorder averaging, I derive a nonlinear sigma model that captures measurement back-action and the competition between interaction-induced scrambling and information extraction, predicting characteristic crossover scales and response signatures that distinguish weak monitoring from fully unitary evolution. Third, I develop a strong-disorder renormalization group for measurement-only SYK clusters, based on the SO(2n) replica algebra and Dasgupta-Ma decimation rules. The flow shows features reminiscent of infinite-randomness behavior, but an order-of-limits subtlety renders the leading recursions non-robust, so the analytic evidence for an infinite-randomness fixed point is inconclusive, even though the average second Renyi entropy displays logarithmic scaling. Together, these results provide a unified language to diagnose when many-body dynamics generate operational randomness and how measurements redirect that flow.
Randomness generation through quantum-chaotic evolution underpins foundational questions in statistical mechanics and applications across quantum information science, including benchmarking, tomography, metrology, and demonstrations of quantum computational advantage. While statistical mechanics successfully captures the temporal averages of local observables, understanding randomness at the level of higher statistical moments remains a daunting challenge, with analytic progress largely confined to random quantum circuit models or fine-tuned systems exhibiting space-time duality. Here we study how much randomness can be dynamically generated by generic quantum-chaotic evolution under physical, non-random Hamiltonians. Combining theoretical insights with numerical simulations, we show that for broad classes of initially unentangled states, the dynamics become effectively Haar-random well before the system can ergodically explore the physically accessible Hilbert space. Both local and highly nonlocal observables, including entanglement measures, equilibrate to their Haar expectation values and fluctuations on polynomial timescales with remarkably high numerical precision, and with the fastest randomization occurring in regions of parameter space previously identified as maximally chaotic. Interestingly, this effective randomization can occur on timescales linear in system size, suggesting that the sub-ballistic growth of Renyi entropies typically observed in systems with conservation laws can be bypassed in non-random Hamiltonians with an appropriate choice of initial conditions.
Information-theoretic quantities such as Renyi entropies show a remarkable universality in their late-time behavior across a variety of chaotic many-body systems. Understanding how such common features emerge from very different microscopic dynamics remains an important challenge. In this work, we address this question in a class of Brownian models with random time-dependent Hamiltonians and a variety of different microscopic couplings. In any such model, the Lorentzian time evolution of the n th Renyi entropy can be mapped to evolution by a Euclidean Hamiltonian on 2 n copies of the system. We provide evidence that in systems with no symmetries, the low-energy excitations of the Euclidean Hamiltonian are universally given by a gapped quasiparticlelike band. The eigenstates in this band are plane waves of locally dressed domain walls between ferromagnetic ground states associated with two permutations in the symmetric group S n . These excitations give rise to the membrane picture of entanglement growth, with the membrane tension determined by their dispersion relation. We establish this structure in a variety of cases using analytical perturbative methods and numerical variational techniques and extract the associated dispersion relations and membrane tensions for the second and third Renyi entropies. For the third Renyi entropy, we argue that phase transitions in the membrane tension as a function of velocity are needed to ensure that physical constraints on the membrane tension are satisfied. Overall, this structure provides an understanding of entanglement dynamics in terms of a universal set of gapped low-lying modes, which may also apply to systems with time-independent Hamiltonians.