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Title: The NOvA simulation chain

Journal Article · · Journal of Physics. Conference Series
 [1];  [2];  [3];  [4];  [5];  [2];  [6];  [1]
  1. Univ. of Cincinnati, Cincinnati, OH (United States)
  2. California Institute of Technology, Pasadena, CA (United States)
  3. Fermi National Accelerator Lab. (FNAL), Batavia, IL (United States)
  4. Tufts Univ., Medford, MA (United States)
  5. Indiana Univ., Bloomington, IN (United States)
  6. Harvard Univ., Cambridge, MA (United States)
+ Show Author Affiliations

The NOvA experiment is a two-detector, long-baseline neutrino experiment operating in the recently upgraded NuMI muon neutrino beam. Simulating neutrino interactions and backgrounds requires many steps including: the simulation of the neutrino beam flux using FLUKA and the FLUGG interface, cosmic ray generation using CRY, neutrino interaction modeling using GENIE, and a simulation of the energy deposited in the detector using GEANT4. To shorten generation time, the modeling of detector-specific aspects, such as photon transport, detector and electronics noise, and readout electronics, employs custom, parameterized simulation applications. We will describe the NOvA simulation chain, and present details on the techniques used in modeling photon transport near the ends of cells, and in developing a novel data-driven noise simulation. Due to the high intensity of the NuMI beam, the Near Detector samples a high rate of muons originating in the surrounding rock. In addition, due to its location on the surface at Ash River, MN, the Far Detector collects a large rate ((˜) 140 kHz) of cosmic muons. Furthermore, we will discuss the methods used in NOvA for overlaying rock muons and cosmic ray muons with simulated neutrino interactions and show how realistically the final simulation reproduces the preliminary NOvA data.

Research Organization:
Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory (FNAL), Batavia, IL (United States)
Sponsoring Organization:
USDOE Office of Science (SC), High Energy Physics (HEP)
Grant/Contract Number:
AC02-07CH11359
OSTI ID:
1250781
Report Number(s):
FERMILAB-CONF-15-203-ND; 1413985
Journal Information:
Journal of Physics. Conference Series, Vol. 664, Issue 7; Conference: 21st International Conference on Computing in High Energy and Nuclear Physics, Okinawa (Japan), 13-17 Apr 2015; ISSN 1742-6588
Publisher:
IOP PublishingCopyright Statement
Country of Publication:
United States
Language:
English
Citation Metrics:
Cited by: 18 works
Citation information provided by
Web of Science

References (6)

The FLUKA Code: Developments and Challenges for High Energy and Medical Applications journal June 2014
FLUKA: A Multi-Particle Transport Code report December 2005
The GENIE neutrino Monte Carlo generator
  • Andreopoulos, C.; Bell, A.; Bhattacharya, D.
  • Nuclear Instruments and Methods in Physics Research Section A: Accelerators, Spectrometers, Detectors and Associated Equipment, Vol. 614, Issue 1 https://doi.org/10.1016/j.nima.2009.12.009
journal February 2010
Geant4—a simulation toolkit
  • Agostinelli, S.; Allison, J.; Amako, K.
  • Nuclear Instruments and Methods in Physics Research Section A: Accelerators, Spectrometers, Detectors and Associated Equipment, Vol. 506, Issue 3 https://doi.org/10.1016/S0168-9002(03)01368-8
journal July 2003
Geant4 developments and applications journal February 2006
The probability distribution of gains in avalanche photodiodes journal October 1976

Cited By (3)

Context-enriched identification of particles with a convolutional network for neutrino events journal October 2019
First measurement of electron neutrino appearance in NOvA text January 2016
Search for active-sterile neutrino mixing using neutral-current interactions in NOvA text January 2017

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