The form factors of the nucleons

The study of the electromagnetic form factors of the nucleons are of fundamental importance in understanding nucleon structure. The form factors contain all the information about the deviation from pointlike structure of the charge and magnetization current distributions of the nucleons. The hope is that measurements at sufficiently large momentum transfers can provide a microscopic understanding of the nucleon wave functions in terms of their constituent quark amplitudes. Recent measurements of the electric G{sub E}(Q{sup 2}) and magnetic G{sub M}(Q{sup 2}) form factors of the nucleons are reviewed and compared to theoretical calculations based on non-perturbative QCD sum rules, diquark, relativistic constituent quark, and vector meson dominance (VMD) models. A short summary of ongoing and future measurements is also presented.