Three-dimensional skyrmions in spin-2 Bose-Einstein condensates

TL;DR

This paper reports the theoretical prediction and numerical simulation of stable three-dimensional skyrmions in spin-2 Bose-Einstein condensates, highlighting their potential for experimental realization despite phase instability.

Contribution

It introduces topologically stable 3D skyrmions in spin-2 BECs, demonstrating their creation, stability, and evolution through numerical solutions of the Gross-Pitaevskii equations.

Findings

Skyrmions exhibit high mapping degrees due to symmetry.

Skyrmions can be created and detected experimentally.

Lifetimes are sufficient despite phase instability.

Abstract

We introduce topologically stable three-dimensional skyrmions in the cyclic and biaxial nematic phases of a spin-2 Bose-Einstein condensate. These skyrmions exhibit exceptionally high mapping degrees resulting from the versatile symmetries of the corresponding order parameters. We show how these structures can be created in existing experimental setups and study their temporal evolution and lifetime by numerically solving the three-dimensional Gross-Pitaevskii equations for realistic parameter values. Although the biaxial nematic and cyclic phases are observed to be unstable against transition towards the ferromagnetic phase, their lifetimes are long enough for the skyrmions to be imprinted and detected experimentally.