Disintegration of Hyperfragments. II

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Abstract
The systematic study of hyperfragments has been continued. A total of 32 000 cosmic-ray stars, 10 000 6-Bev proton stars, 32 000 3-Bev π−-meson stars and 206 stars produced by stopped negative K mesons were examined. Twenty hyperfragments were found in the cosmic-ray plates, 7 in the proton plates, 30 in the π−-meson plates and 11 in the negative K-meson plates. The average charge of the hyperfragments is between 4 and 5. The average range of the hyperfragments is about 10 microns. Including previous data from this laboratory, only 2 mesonic decays have been found out of 98 events with Z greater than 2. A total of 7 helium hyperfragments have been observed of which 4 decayed mesonically. Of 4 hydrogen hyperfragments, all decayed with the emission of a π− meson. In the following eight cases, it was possible to measure the total energy release in the hyperfragment disintegration, and hence to find the following values (in Mev) for the binding energy of the Λ0 particle: H3Λ(BΛ=0.6±0.6); H3Λ(BΛ=−0.5±0.6); H3Λ(BΛ=0.4±0.7); H4Λ(BΛ=0.5±2.0 or 1.9±2.0); He4Λ(BΛ=0.0±2.0); He4Λ(BΛ=1.8±0.6); He5Λ(BΛ=2.0±0.6); Be9Λ(BΛ=6.5±0.6). The binding energies tend to increase with increasing mass number. The fact that