Weak Production of Lambda Hyperons from Lepton-proton Scattering

We obtain differential cross sections for the weak strangeness changing reactions ^- +p ---> \Lambda + u_L$ and differential and total cross sections for the reaction $ u_L + p ---> \Lambda +L^+$ where L is a charged lepton, either an electron, muon, or tau. We do this for incoming lepton energies from near threshold to several GeV. We aim this work to complement proposals for experiments by two TJNAF groups and the Miner$ u collaboration. We obtain the contributions of the individual form factors to the cross sections with a view to seeing which ones might be extracted by the proposed experiments. We pay particular attention to the weak magnetism form factor which is of interest to one of the TJNAF groups and to the pseudoscalar form factor as well as to $. This latter form factor is a second class current form factor and is forbidden by G-parity in the corresponding <---> n$ transition but is not forbidden here. Our calculation is a phenomenological one and makes use of SU(3) relations and $\Lambda$ beta decay data.