[Clascomment] Comment on 'Upper limits for the photoproduction cross section for the Phi--(1860) pentaquark state off the deuteron' by Hovanes Egiyan et al.

[Keith Griffioen]

Nice analysis and writeup.

The Caption for Figure 1 needs some more descriptive details

In Figure 3 are you letting in too many electrons in with your upper, box cut at low hadron momentum?  
Why not use a smooth curve like you do for the lower cut?

DOCA isn't defined.  Readers may not associate this with 'Distance Of Closest Approach'

Reword: 'The upper limit at 90% confidence for the photoproduction cross section
for \gamma d \to \Phi^--X \to \Xi^- \pi^- was determined as a function...

You claim 'we have conducted for the first time a search for the \Phi
in real photoproduction...'  and then later state 'This is approximately
a factor of three improvement over the previously estimated upper limit in
photoproduction by the HERMES collaboration...'  Both of these statements
can't be true.

Fig. 10:  '...for the measured quantity \mu...'

I'm curious what your lab momenta were for the Lambdas?  With a decay constant
of 2.631x10^-10 seconds, I would expect for p=0.5 GeV/c that you would have
a 3.5 cm average flight path.  Have you looked for displaced vertices
in CLAS for the Lambda?  This would reduce your backgrounds even further,
I would expect.  In any case, those in the know might ask why you
didn't use displaced vertices, so you may want to comment on this.