Probing kink interactions with fermions

A dilute gas of kinks exhibits strong but short-ranged intrinsic interactions. When these intrinsic interactions are supplemented by other ''extrinsic'' interactions, a phase transition can occur in which kinks and antikinks bind to form a gas of bounces. The extrinsic interactions arise from the coupling of kinks to an additional degree of freedom, which we take to be a fermion field. The class of quantum-mechanical models which we study includes examples of supersymmetry. The way in which kinks and antikinks bind depends in detail on aspects of the intrinsic interactions. This structure is probably shared by field-theoretic models.