Electron 'split-personality' seen in new quasi-particle

[weakmagneto]

18 April 2012
BBC News

Researchers have discovered another way that electrons - one of the Universe's few fundamental particles - can undergo an "identity crisis".

Electrons can divide into "quasi-particles", in which their fundamental properties can split up and move around like independent particles.

Two such quasi-particles had been seen before, but a team reporting in Nature has now confirmed a third: the orbiton.

These orbitons carry the energy of an electron's orbit around a nucleus.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-17754216

[Terry]

Splitting the electron
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lbcRYpfT6jo

What it means to split the electron into quasi-particles?
Isn't the electron behaves AS IF its properties being carried separately by holon for charge, spinon for spin and orbiton for its orbital momentum?
Are quasi-particles just fictitious beasts created for easier treatment in theory?