Intercommutation of Semilocal Strings and Skyrmions

Abstract

We study the intercommuting of semilocal strings and Skyrmions, for a wide range of internal parameters, velocities and intersection angles by numerically evolving the equations of motion. We find that the collisions of strings and strings, strings and Skyrmions, and Skyrmions and Skyrmions, all lead to intercommuting for a wide range of parameters. Even the collisions of unstable Skyrmions and strings leads to intercommuting, demonstrating that the phenomenon of intercommuting is very robust, extending to dissimilar field configurations that are not stationary solutions. Even more remarkably, at least for the semilocal U(2) formulation considered here, all intercommutations trigger a reversion to U(1) Nielsen-Olesen strings.