Domain walls and double bubbles

Abstract

We study configurations of intersecting domain walls in a Wess–Zumino model with three vacua. We introduce a volume-preserving flow and show that its static solutions are configurations of intersecting domain walls that form double bubbles, that is, minimal area surfaces which enclose and separate two prescribed volumes. To illustrate this field theory approach to double bubbles, we use domain walls to reconstruct the phase diagram for double bubbles in the flat square two-torus and also construct all known examples of double bubbles in the flat cubic three-torus.