Bound Skyrmions: Properties and physical consequences of their existence

The characteristic properties of bound Skyrmion states-classical configurations of chiral fields with baryon number B≥2 - are discussed. The rather natural property of an increase of their dimensions and moments of inertia with increasing baryon number leads to a decrease of the zero-mode quantum corrections to the energy of the system and, as a result, to additional stabilization of quantized baryonic systems. The whole soliton approach becomes more self-consistent with increasing B because of the decreasing importance of the quantum corrections. The spectrum of strange dibaryons with strangeness S down to -6 is considered. All these dibaryons are unstable with respect to the strong interactions if use is made of the procedure of subtraction which is necessary to obtain the NN scattering state with the correct energy. SO(3) solitons with B=2 and 4 are also discussed. 48 refs., 2 figs