Photon induced Lambda(1520) production and the role of the K^* exchange

We study the photon induced Lambda(1520) production in the effective Lagrangian method near threshold, E_\gamma^{LAB}<2 GeV, and in the quark-gluon string model at higher energies 3 GeV < E_\gamma^{LAB} < 5 GeV. In particular, we study the role of the K^* exchange for the production of Lambda(1520) within the SU(6) Weinberg-Tomozowa chiral unitary model proposed in Phys. Rev. D74 (2006) 034025. The coupling of the Lambda(1520) resonance to the N \bar K^* pair, which is dynamically generated, turns out to be relatively small and, thus, the K exchange mechanism dominates the reaction. In the higher energy region, where experimental data are available, the quark-gluon string mechanism with the K Regge trajectory reproduces both the energy and the angular distribution dependences of the Lambda(1520) photo-production reaction.