Spectral properties and coding transitions of Haar-random quantum codes

Abstract: A quantum error-correcting code with a nonzero error threshold undergoes a mixed-state phase transition when the error rate reaches that threshold. We explore this phase transition for Haar-random quantum codes, in which the logical information is encoded in a random subspace of the physical Hilbert space. We focus on the spectrum of the encoded system density matrix as a function of the rate of uncorrelated, single-qudit errors. For low error rates, this spectrum consists of well-separated bands, representing errors of different weights. As the error rate increases, the bands for high-weight errors merge. The evolution of these bands with increasing error rate is well described by a simple analytic ansatz. Using this ansatz, as well as an explicit calculation, we show that the threshold for Haar-random quantum codes saturates the hashing bound, and thus coincides with that for random \emph{stabilizer} codes. For error rates that exceed the hashing bound, typical errors are uncorrectable, but postselected error correction remains possible until a much higher \emph{detection} threshold. Postselection can in principle be implemented by projecting onto subspaces corresponding to low-weight errors, which remain correctable past the hashing bound.