Bulletin of the American Physical Society
2009 APS April Meeting
Volume 54, Number 4
Saturday–Tuesday, May 2–5, 2009; Denver, Colorado
Session B12: Neutrino Physics I |
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Sponsoring Units: DNP Chair: Reyco Henning, University of North Carolina Room: Plaza Court 2 |
Saturday, May 2, 2009 10:45AM - 10:57AM |
B12.00001: The Double Chooz Experiment - the Precision Reactor Neutrino Experiment in the Quest for $\theta_{13}$ Jelena Maricic The Double Chooz experiment will perform a highly sensitive measurement of the neutrino mixing angle $\sin^2 2\theta_{13}$. The Double Chooz will utilize a two detector design where the near detector provides an ``unoscillated'' neutrino flux measurement (high count rate, but higher background as well), while the far detector provides the ``oscillated'' neutrino flux characterized by the lower count rate and lower background level. The signal comparison between the two detectors will be necessary to see the subtle sign of $\theta_{13}$. The Double Chooz experiment will contribute to the discovery of $\theta_{13}$ if above 0.03 or improve the existing limit on $\sin^2 2\theta_{13}$ from 0.2 to 0.03 in just 3 years of running of the Double Chooz experiment. Reaching this goal requires significant improvement in systematic uncertainties which will be obtained with careful design, construction and extensive calibrations throughout the detector's active target volume. [Preview Abstract] |
Saturday, May 2, 2009 10:57AM - 11:09AM |
B12.00002: First Anti-Neutrinno Oscillation Results from MiniBooNE Bill Louis The first MiniBooNE neutrino oscillation results published April of 2007 ruled out the simple two neutrino oscillation hypothesis of the LSND experiment. However, MiniBooNE unexpectedly observes a significant excess of electron-like events below a reconstructed neutrino energy of 475 MeV. For the last two years MinibooNE has been running in anti-neutrino mode. The anti-electron neutrino data sample can shed light on the neutrino low energy excess since they share many of the same systematic errors. As well, a search for oscillation at higher energy can be performed. Updated results of the neutrino low energy excess and new anti-neutrino oscillation results will be presented. [Preview Abstract] |
Saturday, May 2, 2009 11:09AM - 11:21AM |
B12.00003: Prospect of Dimuon Analysis at the MINOS Near Detector Azizur Rahaman, Sanjib Mishra We present the prospect for a dimuon analysis in the MINOS Near Detector. A sample of about 10M muon-neutrino charged current events has been accumulated with the MINOS Near Detector. The dimuon analysis focuses on neutrino charm-production where the charmed hadron decays into a positive-muon. The estimates of signal efficiency and background, and the sensitivity to physics parameters will be presented. [Preview Abstract] |
Saturday, May 2, 2009 11:21AM - 11:33AM |
B12.00004: Design, Construction, and Performance of the Antineutrino Detectors for the Daya Bay Reactor $\theta_{13}$ Experiment Karsten M. Heeger The Daya Bay reactor experiment is designed to search for the yet unknown neutrino mixing angle $\theta_{13}$ and make a precise measurement of sin$^22\theta_{13} $ with a sensitivity of $< 0.01$ at 90\% CL. The experiment utilizes the inverse beta-decay reaction of electron antineutrinos on protons to measure the flux of reactor antineutrinos in eight detectors at different distances from the reactors and measure the disappearance of $\overline{\nu}_{e}$. We will describe the design of the antineutrino detectors and report progress on the construction of the Daya Bay experiment. The expected performance of the antineutrino detectors and control of the detector systematics will be discussed. [Preview Abstract] |
Saturday, May 2, 2009 11:33AM - 11:45AM |
B12.00005: Quasi-Elastic Neutrino Interactions in MINOS Nathan Mayer The Main Injector Neutrino Oscillation Search (MINOS) is a two detector, long baseline neutrino oscillation experiment that uses the Neutrinos at the Main Injector (NuMI) beam. The MINOS near detector is located at the Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory near Chicago Illinois. The MINOS far detector is located at the Soudan Mine State Park in Soudan Minnesota. Both MINOS detectors are iron-scintillator tracking/sampling calorimeters. The MINOS near detector has recorded the worlds largest dataset of neutrino interactions in the 0-10 GeV region. This high statistics data set can be used to make high precision measurements of neutrino interaction cross-sections. The $ Q^2 $ dependence in quasi-elastic scattering probes the axial structure (form factor) of the nucleon/nuclear target, and nuclear effects in neutrino scattering. There are curious discrepancies between recent measurements and older ones taken during the bubble chamber era. Two distinct methods for selecting quasi-elastic enhanced neutrino interactions in the MINOS near detector are presented with the resulting selection efficiency and purity. [Preview Abstract] |
Saturday, May 2, 2009 11:45AM - 11:57AM |
B12.00006: Searching for Theta13 at Daya Bay: Overview, Sensitivity, and Schedule Lisa Whitehead The evidence for neutrino oscillations has been well established by solar, atmospheric, reactor, and accelerator experiments. However, one of the three mixing angles, $\theta_{13}$, has not been measured. The goal of the Daya Bay reactor neutrino experiment is to measure $\theta_{13}$, with a sensitivity in $\sin^{2}(2\theta_{13})$ of 0.01 at the 90\% confidence level. The Daya Bay experiment will search for the disappearance of reactor antineutrinos from the Daya Bay nuclear power complex located in Shenzhen, China by measuring the antineutrino rate and energy spectrum with identical detectors located at different baselines. An overview of the experiment and the sensitivity prediction will be presented. [Preview Abstract] |
Saturday, May 2, 2009 11:57AM - 12:09PM |
B12.00007: Neutrino-Nucleus Neutral Current Elastic Interactions in MiniBooNE Denis Perevalov MiniBooNE is an experiment operated at Fermilab looking for neutrino oscillations at $\Delta m^2 \sim 1eV^2$. MiniBooNE uses a neutrino beam produced from 8 GeV protons from the Fermilab Booster incident on a Be target. The Cerenkov detector located 541m from the target is a 12m diameter sphere filled with mineral oil and instrumented with 1280 inner and 240 veto PMTs. Neutral current elastic scattering (NCEL) is one of the most important interactions in MiniBooNE. To date we have recorded about 50000 NCEL interactions in neutrino mode, which represents the biggest sample of such interactions in the world. These data may be used for nuclear model testing. The MiniBooNE NCEL cross-section has been measured and will be presented, as well as the measurement of nuclear model parameters, such as the axial vector mass ($M_A$) and the strange quark contribution to the nucleon spin ($\Delta s$). [Preview Abstract] |
Saturday, May 2, 2009 12:09PM - 12:21PM |
B12.00008: Lowering the Energy Threshold at the Sudbury Neutrino Observatory Gabriel Orebi Gann The Sudbury Neutrino Observatory has successfully demonstrated the phenomenon of neutrino oscillation by observing both the total active solar neutrino flux, via the neutral current interaction on deuterium, and the pure $\nu_e$ component via the charged current interaction. An improved analysis has lowered the energy threshold, resulting in increased statistics and a greater sensitivity to possible distortions in the incident neutrino energy spectrum. This talk discusses the systematic uncertainties dealt with in this analysis and presents the neutrino spectrum down to an effective electron kinetic energy of 3.5$\,$MeV. [Preview Abstract] |
Saturday, May 2, 2009 12:21PM - 12:33PM |
B12.00009: Obtaining the Electron Neutrino Survival Probability from the Low Energy Data from the Sudbury Neutrino Observatory Stanley Seibert The charged current interaction between electron neutrinos and deuterium in the Sudbury Neutrino Observatory has excellent sensitivity to the energy distribution of the electron neutrinos at the Earth. Using this information and the total active solar neutrino flux measured by the neutral current process, we can directly extract the electron neutrino survival probability as a function of neutrino energy. This talk presents the survival probability obtained from an analysis of the data collected in the first two phases of SNO with an effective electron kinetic energy threshold of 3.5 MeV. [Preview Abstract] |
Saturday, May 2, 2009 12:33PM - 12:45PM |
B12.00010: Solar neutrino oscillation parameters and survival probability obtained from the combined low energy threshold analysis at the Sudbury Neutrino Observatory Olivier Simard The SNO Collaboration has reanalyzed the data from the first two phases of the experiment - the pure heavy water and salt phases - in order to extend the observed kinetic energy spectra of neutral- and charged-currents, and elastic scattering events down to as low as 3.5 MeV. The combined nature of the analysis, with the reassessment of the systematics and backgrounds, has improved the neutral-current flux determination of 8B solar neutrinos. In the context of the solar standard model (SSM) and neutrino oscillation theories, the newest SNO results are of great importance in understanding the energy production in the Sun and the interaction of neutrinos with matter. In particular, the absolute 8B flux scale and survival probability are measured, and the parameters of the various models, such as the SSM and matter-enhanced neutrino oscillations with and without the effect of $\theta_{13}$, constrained. Finally the analysis is repeated by combining a collection of results from solar and reactor experiments with the SNO data to obtain a global estimation of the neutrino mixing parameters. [Preview Abstract] |
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