  We consider whether quantum coherence in the form of mutual entanglement
between a pair of qubits is susceptible to decay that may be more rapid than
the decay of the coherence of either qubit individually. An instance of
potential importance for solid state quantum computing arises if embedded
qubits (spins, quantum dots, Cooper pair boxes, etc.) are exposed to global and
local noise at the same time. Here we allow separate phase-noisy channels to
affect local and non-local measures of system coherence. We find that the time
for decay of the qubit entanglement can be significantly shorter than the time
for local dephasing of the individual qubits.
