Solitonic fullerene structures in light atomic nuclei

The Skyrme model is a classical field theory which has topological soliton solutions. These solitons are candidates for describing nuclei, with an ide ntification between the numbers of solitons and nucleons. We have computed numerically, using two different minimization algorithms, minimum energy co nfigurations for up to 22 solitons. We find, remarkably, that the solutions for seven or more solitons have nucleon density isosurfaces in the form of polyhedra made of hexagons and pentagons. Precisely these structures arise , though at the much larger molecular scale, in the chemistry of carbon she lls, where they are known as fullerenes.