Photoproduction of the Very Strangest Baryons on a Proton Target in CLAS12

We propose to study the production mechanisms of the S = −2,−3 baryons in exclusive photonuclear reactions with the CLAS12 detector. The proposed experiment, to be run in parallel with the approved CLAS12 meson spectroscopy experiment [E12-11-005], is expected to yield total samples containing ∼ 7000 Ω− (S = −3) and several millions Ξ (S = −2) baryons after reconstruction, based on predicted cross sections and simulated results. These data would provide the statistics necessary to obtain the first precision measurement of the Ω− differential cross section in the reaction γp→ Ω−K+K+K0, and to search for excited Ω− states. This experiment would provide the world’s largest sample of cascade baryons in a photoproduction environment. Our cascade data sample would be used to search for new and missing excited Ξ states with the possibility to measure their quantum numbers, as well as the mass splittings of ground state and excited cascade doublets. In addition, we would extract spin-parity information of the already-established Ξ(1690) and Ξ(1820) from a double-moment analysis. These Ξ data samples would also provide the statistics necessary for measuring, for the first time as a function of kinematic variables, the beam polarization transfer and induced polarization of the ground state Ξ− in the reaction γp→ Ξ−K+K−.