Photoproduction of K+K- meson pairs on the proton

Lombardo, S.; Battaglieri, M.; Celentano, A.; D'Angelo, A.; De Vita, R.; Filippi, A.; Glazier, D. I.; Hughes, S. M.; Mathieu, V.; Rizzo, A.; Santopinto, E.; Stankovic, I.; Szczepaniak, A. P.; Watts, D.; Zana, L.; Adhikari, S.; Akbar, Z.; Avakian, H.; Ball, J.; Baltzell, N. A.; Barion, L.; Bashkanov, M.; Batourine, V.; Bedlinskiy, I.; Biselli, A. S.; Boiarinov, S.; Briscoe, W. J.; Burkert, V. D.; Cao, F.; Carman, D. S.; Chatagnon, P.; Chetry, T.; Ciullo, G.; Clark, L.; Clary, B. A.; Cole, P. L.; Contalbrigo, M.; Crede, V.; Dashyan, N.; De Sanctis, E.; Defurne, M.; Deur, A.; Diehl, S.; Djalali, C.; Dugger, M.; Dupre, R.; Egiyan, H.; Ehrhart, M.; El Alaoui, A.; El Fassi, L.; Eugenio, P.; Fedotov, G.; Gavalian, G.; Ghandilyan, Y.; Gilfoyle, G. P.; Giovanetti, K. L.; Girod, F. X.; Golovatch, E.; Gothe, R. W.; Griffioen, K. A.; Guidal, M.; Guo, L.; Hafidi, K.; Hakobyan, H.; Harrison, N.; Hattawy, M.; Heddle, D.; Hicks, K.; Holtrop, M.; Ilieva, Y.; Ireland, D. G.; Ishkhanov, B. S.; Isupov, E. L.; Jenkins, D.; H. S., Jo; Johnston, S.; Joo, K.; Kabir, M. L.; Keller, D.; Khachatryan, G.; Khachatryan, M.; Khandaker, M.; Kim, A.; Kim, W.; Klein, A.; Klein, F. J.; Kubarovsky, V.; Lanza, L.; Lenisa, P.; Livingston, K.; Macgregor, I. J. D.; Marchand, D.; Markov, N.; Mckinnon, B.; Mestayer, M. D.; Meyer, C. A.; Meziani, Z. E.; Mirazita, M.; Mokeev, V.; Montgomery, R. A.; Munoz Camacho, C.; Nadel-Turonski, P.; Niccolai, S.; Niculescu, G.; Osipenko, M.; Ostrovidov, A. I.; Paolone, M.; Paremuzyan, R.; Park, K.; Pasyuk, E.; Pogorelko, O.; Price, J. W.; Prok, Y.; Protopopescu, D.; Ripani, M.; Riser, D.; Ritchie, B. G.; Rosner, G.; Sabatié, F.; Salgado, C.; Schumacher, R. A.; Sharabian, Y. G.; Skorodumina, Iu.; Smith, G. D.; Sober, D. I.; Sokhan, D.; Sparveris, N.; Strakovsky, I. I.; Strauch, S.; Taiuti, M.; Tan, J. A.; Ungaro, M.; Voskanyan, H.; Voutier, E.; Wang, R.; Wei, X.; Wood, M. H.; Zachariou, N.; Zhang, J.; Zhao, Z. W.

doi:10.1103/PhysRevD.98.052009

The exclusive reaction γp→pK+K- was studied in the photon energy range 3.0-3.8 GeV and momentum transfer range 0.6<-t<1.3 GeV2. Data were collected with the CLAS detector at the Thomas Jefferson National Accelerator Facility. In this kinematic range the integrated luminosity was approximately 20 pb-1. The reaction was isolated by detecting the K+ and the proton in CLAS, and reconstructing the K- via the missing-mass technique. Moments of the dikaon decay angular distributions were extracted from the experimental data. Besides the dominant contribution of the φ meson in the P wave, evidence for S-P interference was found. The differential production cross sections dσ/dt for individual waves in the mass range of the φ resonance were extracted and compared to predictions of a Regge-inspired model. This is the first time the t-dependent cross section of the S-wave contribution to the elastic K+K- photoproduction has been measured.