Paper detail

Loosening up the Skyrme model

We consider the Skyrme model with the addition of extra scalar potentials that decrease the classical binding energies of the Skyrmions to about the 3% level -- without altering the pion mass -- if we insist on keeping platonic symmetries that are usually possessed by Skyrmions. A side effect of the potentials under consideration is the smaller size of the 1-Skyrmion resulting in a smaller moment of inertia and in turn a larger spin contribution to the energy upon semi-classical quantization. After taking into account the quantum contributions we find total binding energies at the 6% level.