Metastable Composite Vortices in Spinor Condensates

The ground states of condensates of atoms with spin have a variety of symmetries leading to many types of vortices. The quadratic Zeeman effect produces composite metastable vortices, which are configurations of vortices held together by a force resulting from the Zeeman effect as we explain. If the component vortices were to conbine together and react to form a different set of components, then the composite vortex could break up. However, this is prevented by short-range repulsions. Our analysis focuses on the cyclic phase, where the chemistry of the vortices is regulated by the symmetry group of a tetrahedron.