Nucleon deformation

The conjectured deformation of hadrons and its experimental verification offer a particularly fertile ground for understanding the intricate dynamics of their constituents and QCD at the confiment scale. The detailed study of the transition is viewed as the preferred method of experimental investigation of this central issue in hadronic physics. A brief overview of the field is presented, followed by a presentation of the most recent results from Bates program. The new Bates/OOPS data at Q ² = 0.127 GeV/c ²) yield and and they exclude a spherical nucleon and/or . The magnitude and the origin of the deformation is the focus of the ongoing and planned investigations.Received: 30 September 2002, Published online: 22 October 2003PACS: 13.60.Le Meson production - 13.88. + e Polarization in interactions and scattering - 13.40.Gp Electromagnetic form factors - 14.20.Gk Baryon resonances with S = 0C.N. Papanicolas: Invited plenary talk