Nucleon Resonances in Kaon Photoproduction

Abstract

Nucleon resonances are investigated through the electromagnetic production of K-mesons. We study the kaon photoproduction process at tree-level and compare to a recently developed unitary K-matrix approach. Employing hadronic form factors along with the proper gauge prescription yields suppression of the Born terms and leads a resonance dominated process for both K-Lambda and K-Sigma photoproduction. Using new SAPHIR data we find the K+-Lambda photoproduction to be dominated by the S11(1650) at threshold, with additional contributions from the P11(1710) and P13(1720) states. The K-Sigma channel couples to a cluster of Delta resonances around W = 1900 MeV. We briefly discuss some tantalizing evidence for a missing D13 resonance around 1900 MeV with a strong branching ratio into KLambda channel.