Global strings and superfluid vortices

Abstract

We explain the relationship between global strings of the Abelian Higgs model and vortices in a superfluid. We show that the nonrelativistic Magnus force law for vortices can be derived from global-string dynamics, but only when an external background field has a special Lorentz-noninvariant configuration ${\mathrm{H}}^{\mathrm{ijk}}$∝${\mathrm{\epsilon }}^{\mathrm{ijk}}$. We present a self-consistent classical theory for relativistic Higgs vortices in a superfluid, and show that superfluid vortices can be described as a system of spinning global strings.