Projected Symmetry Breaking in Dipole-Locked $$^3$$ 3 He-B

Abstract

We show theoretically that a collision of two superfluid droplets can effectively cause a two-dimensional symmetry breaking phase transition. Three-dimensional nucleation of quantized vortices and/or hedgehogs in the collision are considered the formation of domain walls and/or point vortices due to the Kibble–Zurek mechanism in a projected two-dimensional space. This problem is generally applicable to arbitrarily ordered media that undergo spontaneous breaking of continuous symmetries.