Hypernuclear Spectroscopy

One of the main tasks of nuclear physics is the study of subatomic particles and their interactions. The nucleon-nucleon interactions have been extensively studied over the last decades and have been supported with plenty of experimental data. The discovery of a new quantum number, strangeness, and a new type of particles that contain it, hyperons, spurred a renewed interest in science. New classes of interactions, hyperon-nucleon, and hyperon- hyperon, evolved. One of the best ways to study such interactions is to place a hyperon inside a nucleus, where it serves as a probe of the internal structure and might manifest properties that cannot be seen in an ordinary nucleus. This book presents the high resolution spectroscopy of light to medium hypernuclei recently obtained in Jefferson Laboratory. The main emphasis is given to the physics of the core-excited states. The described analysis techniques allowed achieving high quality missing mass spectra with energy resolution of 400- 500 keV, an unprecedented value in the history of hypernuclear reaction spectroscopy.