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Title: Current Status for the Inclusive Neutral Current $$\pi^{0}$$ production Cross Section Measurement with the NOvA Near Detector

Conference ·
OSTI ID:1413683

NOvA (NuMI Off-axis {\nu}e Appearance) experiment is designed to study long-baseline neutrino oscillations using two detectors, the Near Detector (ND) at Fermilab and the Far Detector (FD) at a distance 810 km in Northern Minnesota. NOvA looks for the $$\nu_{e}$$ appearance at the FD using a narrow band $$\nu_\mu$$ beam peaked at 2 GeV in energy. Neutral Current (NC) interactions with a $$\pi^{0}$$ in the final state represent the main background in the $$\nu_{e}$$ appearance measurement. The $$\pi^{0}$$ decay into two photons can fake the $$\nu_{e}$$ appearance signal in two ways either two photon showers merge together or one of the two photons may escape the detection. Therefore, a complete understanding of $$\nu_{\mu}$$ induced NC interactions with $$\pi^{0}$$ in the final state is very important. It will also help in reducing the background uncertainties for current and future long-baseline neutrino oscillation experiments. We present here the current status of the analysis related to the inclusive NC $$\pi^{0}$$ production cross section measurement with the NOvA ND.

Research Organization:
Fermi National Accelerator Lab. (FNAL), Batavia, IL (United States)
Sponsoring Organization:
USDOE Office of Science (SC), High Energy Physics (HEP)
DOE Contract Number:
AC02-07CH11359
OSTI ID:
1413683
Report Number(s):
arXiv:1710.02601; FERMILAB-CONF-17-515-E; 1629154
Resource Relation:
Conference: Meeting of the APS Division of Particles and Fields, Batavia, Illinois, USA, 07/31-08/04/2017
Country of Publication:
United States
Language:
English