Hopf solitons and elastic rods

Hopf solitons in the Skyrme-Faddeev model are stringlike topological solitons classified by the integer-valued Hopf charge. In this paper we introduce an approximate description of Hopf solitons in terms of elastic rods. The general form of the elastic rod energy is derived from the field theory energy and is found to be an extension of the classical Kirchhoff rod energy. Using a minimal extension of the Kirchhoff energy, it is shown that a simple elastic rod model can reproduce many of the qualitative features of Hopf solitons in the Skyrme-Faddeev model. Features that are captured by the model include the buckling of the charge three solution, the formation of links at charges five and six, and the minimal energy trefoil knot at charge seven.