Impact of the internal modes on the sphaleron decay

Abstract We study the sphaleron solutions in two deformations of the $$\phi ^6$$ <mml:math xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML"> <mml:msup> <mml:mi>ϕ</mml:mi> <mml:mn>6</mml:mn> </mml:msup> </mml:math> model and analyze the oscillons originated from them. We find that the presence of internal modes plays a crucial role in the sphaleron collapse. The positive internal modes triggered by a squeezing of the sphaleron are able to change the direction of collapse. We provide an analytical understanding behind this phenomenon.