Approximate analytical solutions of the baby Skyrme model

We show that many properties of the baby skyrmions, which have been determined numerically, can be understood in terms of an analytic approximation. In particular, we show that the approximation captures properties of the multiskyrmion solutions (derived numerically) such as their stability towards decay into various channels, and that it is more accurate for the “new baby Skyrme model” describing anisotropic physical systems in terms of multiskyrmion fields with axial symmetry. Some universal characteristics of configurations of this kind are demonstrated that are independent of their topological number.