Liouvillian Spectral Transition in Noisy Quantum Many-Body Scars

Abstract

Understanding the behavior of quantum many-body systems under decoherence is essential for developing robust quantum technologies. Here, we examine the fate of weak ergodicity breaking in systems hosting quantum many-body scars when subject to local pure dephasing -- an experimentally relevant form of environmental noise. Focusing on a large class of models with an approximate su(2)-structured scar subspace, we show that scarred eigenmodes of the Liouvillean exhibit a transition reminiscent of spontaneous $\mathbb{PT}$-symmetry breaking as the dephasing strength increases. Unlike previously studied non-Hermitian mechanisms, this transition arises from a distinct quantum jump effect. Remarkably, in platforms such as the XY spin ladder and PXP model of Rydberg atom arrays, the critical dephasing rate shows only weak dependence on the system size, revealing an unexpected robustness of scarred dynamics in noisy environments.