Baryon production in e+e- annihilation at PETRA

The thesis concerns baryon production in e+e- annihilation to hadrons obtained from the TASSO experiment at the PETRA e+e-colliding beam facility. The general features of hadron production in fragmentation are described, along with baryon production, current phenomenological models of fragmentation, and the TASSO detector. An exhaustive search for the decuplet baryons Δ++ (1232) and Σ*+-(1385) from an investigation of the pπ+ and Λπ+- invariant mass distributions is described. No evidence for decuplet baryon production has been found in these data, and 95% confidence level (cl) upper limits of Δ++/p < 14%, (Σ*+ + Σ*-)/Λ < 29% have been obtained at W approx. 34 GeV. Models to quantitatively explain the observed baryon rates are discussed. Finally the experimental implication of possible pointlike and extended diquark structures is considered. (U.K.)